Fractions
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I wrote once about counting, one of the tricks I use to absorb myself in a swim workout. Lately what I’ve been counting, more urgently than freestyle strokes, is the days. As I write, there are five more until my wrist splint is history.
On a long run, I tend to note when I’ve made it one-tenth of the way, and then I might also clock the first quarter or the first third—but these major fractions at first get farther apart from each other. On a twelve-mile run, only one mile separates one-fourth of the distance from a third of it. But after that you have to run twice as far, two miles, to make it to half.
At the halfway mark, though, the math reverses, and the fractions start coming closer together. One-half gives way to two-thirds and then three-quarters and then the dominos fall, if you’re lucky, just a bit faster than the weariness can stretch out time. By the time you’ve made it nine-tenths of the way, you’re basically done, even if that last tenth is longer than any of the first nine. This low-grade arithmetic is good for a dehydrated brain.
I am nine-tenths of the way through having a splint on my wrist, so I’m basically done. This week I took my (proverbial) insurance check to the shop and got a new bicycle, slower and more comfortable than the last one, and stabler. Cervélo has updated the design of its handlebars; they’re easy to grip. The man who sold me the bike asked, tenderly, if I felt OK being out on the streets when I test-rode it, if I had any discomfort with the crowds. As I left, he said, “No fear.”
In the yoga class I teach, I talk about using the practice of yoga to gather the pieces of ourselves that we’ve left behind—in arguments, in problems unsolved, in commitments to other people, in forgetfulness, in reverie—so that we can cohere again. This is not something you have to do on purpose if you practice yoga; it’s what the yoga does.
On Instagram recently, I wrote about returning to the scene of my crash:
“I’ve learned to run to and past places where I encountered pain, or joy that curdled under the force of later events. Running is a practice I’ve built through love and determination, but not much ease, and I want to make that known here, to send its reverberance to the times and places where my power fell short.”
We leave pieces around, but then sometimes later we find them, and realize that they still fit. That’s union; that’s integrity. Over time, maybe you figure out how to put yourself together.
Kindly send me your thoughts, questions, and provocations: dmichaelowen@gmail.com. And say hi on Instagram, or let’s Peloton together: @leggy_blond.