January 24th

There comes a time when I need to run. Sunday was that day. I’ll admit, its been a while, but It needed to happen. I ran the three miles to the gym and then swam. I also realized that my sickness of last week destroyed me. I had to run/walk those three miles, and my arms weren’t pulling any water. I felt pathetic. I’m usually one of the faster people in this pool, but I couldn’t make it more than 100 yards before taking a breather.
The lanes are also tiny and I had to share, so I was right up next to the lane line. The creepy fat girl next to me groped me more times than could possibly be accidental. This did not help my immediate dislike of most fat people. I also thought she was an old lady, and then I saw her face and realized she was about my age. It was at this point I decided I would go lift weights instead of swimming. I Showered, dried off, and went to the weight room where I realized I couldn’t really move and the weight machines were really intimidating. So I left.
There is something to be said for walking down the street in shorts and a t shirt in the middle of January passing by people in their knee length north face down jackets thick wool hats. To make the juxtaposition even more real, and more importantly because I had burned more calories than I’ve taken in the past two days, I stopped and got a mango smoothie.
Flashback to Friday night:
I went to a store I recently found that sells large loaves of delicious bread for $2.50. I went to the counter to purchase said loaf, and the man behind the counter told me that I needed to spend eight dollars to use a credit card. I only had a dollar, and they were closing so I asked if I could run to the nearest Automated Teller Machine machine and get some money with which to pay him. He said I could just pay a dollar for now and get the rest to him next time I was there. I gained a little faith in humanity.
So today I went to a used bookstore and asked the clerk if he had anything by Hunter S. Thompson. He told me that Hunter comes and goes quickly, but he saw a paperback copy sitting on top of a row of books in the paperback section in the back of the store, on the second row from the bottom. He was right. It cost one dollar. Since I spent my last dollar on a loaf of bread, and he only took cash, I said I was going to run to the ATM quick and come back. He gave me the book and told me I didn’t need to hurry. I could have just walked away with it.
I’ve gone back since, and he remembered me. People amaze me. We all have such a great need to be loved. Some of us fulfill this by vying for others attention. Whether this be through arguing our point until we seem correct and wise, or showing off our bodies and working out. Some fill the hole with other things, drugs, alcohol, sex. Some seek women, men, or God. Some seek a desperate combination of these things.
And others have got it figured out. They give that hungry kid a loaf of bread for more than half off. They let him have the book without paying just yet. They trust the inherently evil stranger to pay them back. It’s things like this that let me know that there is a God.