Until this summer, I would never have considered myself a runner. In fact, my description for people who ran on a regular basis was “crazies.” And now I am one of those crazies. I am a crazy person who puts on running gear and runs several miles and feels absolutely wonderful afterwards. I’m not going to use the silly cliche about getting high on adrenaline or oxygen or life (I have to give myself a little more credit than that) but the feeling that I encounter after pushing myself for a few miles on a run through my neighborhood is harder to describe than I initially would have imagined. Luckily, I have Haruki Murakami to help me out on this one:

“As I run I tell myself to think of a river. And clouds. But essentially I’m not thinking of a thing. All I do is keep on running in my own cozy, homemade void, my own nostalgic silence. And this is a pretty wonderful thing. No matter what anybody else says.” –What I Talk About When I Talk About Running 

This is exactly why I am now a runner. I love losing myself to the physical aspect of putting one foot in front of the other and just going. After making some relatively big life decisions this summer – which included making the move from Nashville down to Jackson without having a job lined up or any sort of actual plan for that matter (insert thanks to my Lemuria family for taking me in!) – I found running to be the perfect distraction. At first, half a mile was overwhelming, but I have eventually worked my way up to around 5 miles and am pretty proud of it! I am even planning, perhaps a little too ambitiously, to run the Mardi Gras half marathon down in New Orleans at the beginning of March 2012. Whoa.

A couple of weeks ago I picked up What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, Murakami’s memoir about running, writing and how he intertwines the two in his life. (We’ve recently had some Murakami fever at the store due to the fact that his latest novel, 1Q84, hit the shelves this past week.) Not having read any of Murakami’s work, fiction or non-fiction, I didn’t really know where to begin, so I started with his memoir on running. If nothing else, I hoped it could give me some inspiration. Thus far, I have not been disappointed.

Reading Murakami’s thoughts on running, writing and life in general has been similar to having a really wonderful one-sided conversation-0ne of those conversations where you can’t get a word in edgewise, but you really don’t mind because what the other person has to say is so interesting that you want to keep listening. Even a person who is not into running would enjoy reading Murakami’s memoir, and I cannot wait to get into his fiction, which is highly recommended by several Lemurians. (And to any readers who feel they are up for the half marathon in March, see you in NOLA my friends!)

Click here to see all of Haruki Murakmai’s books.

Click here to see other blog posts on Murakami.

by Anna

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