Hmm, I dunno what this one will be about...

I feel like I have little to share today. Not that nothing new has happened to me here, I really just feel as though I have very little to share. Maybe that is because I am adjusting to life here, so it doesn't seem so relevant for me to share each waking moment. Though I highly doubt that considering some of the thoughts that run through my head here.

Isn't that a strange phrase...thoughts running through our heads? Half the time a thought is truly just a fleeting moment, so it may seem to be running to us. But what seems more strange to me is the odd sensation that time slows down when thoughts are flying by. When I am completely peaceful, when I am laying by my stove, eating my pan-fried mutton and onions (a staple food here), it's not like I am not thinking anything. In fact, if I focus upon the activities going on in my head, I see a million thoughts flying by, most of which are but fragments. Something like onion...skylight...beautiful... Saikhan...purpose?...content...run tomorrow?...English English English...dreams. A million thoughts bring an incredible amount of comfort, whereas one thought drives you crazy.

I suppose I experienced this just yesterday as I ran my first 18k run. In all honesty, I didn't go out expecting to run so far. I have a run that I love here, and it is around 8k. Four kilometers out, four back. But I knew, upon waking, that I needed to run a little further. Not that I had an exceptional amount of physical energy, I simply felt restless, and I knew that a long, even-paced run would set me at ease. And so I set out.

The run isn't incredibly exciting in-and-of itself. Mostly the path runs along a dirt road, following cow and horse trails now and then, as it winds further and further south of my town. Eventually, you come upon three dips, the first of which is a simple up and down (less than 15 feet altitude change). The second takes the longest, but only because it stretches out for about 200 meters. The up and down is maybe 45 feet. Then the third dip comes along. And it doesn't give you a break. Right after you reach the pitch immediately following the second hill, you're descending into this bowl. At this point in my run, regardless of any thought I may be stuck on, my mind immediately turns to the hill before me. That says a lot about the nature of the hill. It demands your attention once you come upon it. It has something to it in the eyes of a runner that things like the Grand Canyon and the Moon have to all people. It refuses to be ignored.

I noticed all of these features of the 3 dips as I ran today. Yet, I had run them many times before, without so much as a single thought in their direction. I could attempt to explain why, but I feel like simply stating the fact is sufficient enough. Like when someone divulges to you that they find themselves intimidating at times. Naturally, you want to ask why they feel that way, but then you consider the fact that any response they could give you would only make them seem vain and conceited; and so, you hold your tongue and simply comfort them.

But I ran on. I continued running up and down smaller hills...ones that I had never seen before. Ones that I had no previous connection with. At this point, a certain truck pulled up alongside me, and the driver waved me down. This wasn't the first time I had seen the truck on this run. Actually, I had waved to the driver twice before this moment, and spoke a few words with him as I was contemplating my dips and hills. But, up until now, those moments had seemed irrelevant. Now, however, the truck became my personal cheerleading section. The driver would go a few kilometers into the distance, wait for me to catch up, then continue on for another few kilometers.

Suddenly, I wasn't running through the Mongolian steppe, I was running my own personal marathon. Each and every rise gave view to a continuing road that my feet would feel every inch of. 14k into the run, my body began to give out. The first 4k were standard, my body had been there before. The next 4k were new only in that the ground upon which I ran was untouched by my soles. The next 6k escaped completely from my mind. At that point, I can only assume my body took the meaning that we weren't stopping at our usual checkpoint. But when 14 rolled around, my stomach gave a lurch, my hip flexors seized, and the world disappeared around me. I retreated into every ache. Suddenly my mind felt surrounded by a strange goo. My eyes could see that the grasses and the road were clear ahead of me, but my body dominated all perception. Each movement of one foot before the other was a struggle with some other body. I felt like a brain put in another's body, like a newborn just learning to walk. The final 4k took their toll, but none so much as the last 1 kilometer, where I was confronted with the steepest hill yet. All I could think of was how I wished I wasn't here, at this moment in time, living in this exact spot with this exact goal in mind. I would trade anything to be anyone, anywhere else. But I pushed myself up, at a pace slower than a walk, but continuing to bounce my feet, pretending I was flying up this hill.

And it hit me at the top. Once I hit my imagined finish line, my pseudo-cheerleader patting me on the back, asking how I felt...this is what happens when I am sad, depressed, lonely or anxious. I have a hill to push myself up, and it is always at the end. It is always there, when you want to give up most. It makes you think only about the challenge it presents and not the reward of reaching the top. But the reward at the top is always the same...freedom from the trench that you have dug yourself. Freedom from your depression and angst. The freedom to watch all your thoughts fly by, just like the first three hills you made it up and down without so much as a second glance.