Saturday Morning

1. Night Before the Day

It was dark. Orion shined directly overhead. And the air was cool.

The hot summer runs of only a few weeks ago seemed a distant memory. It finally felt like fall. We ran along the trail in the dark, as we have for several months, choosing the predawn hours to escape the heat.

Somewhere ahead, we heard the cadence of many feet. In an instant a dozen bodies appeared out of the darkness running the other way, like two trains passing in the night. We exchanged greetings, and then they were gone.

Group after group we passed this way, some running in groups, some running in pairs, some by themselves, some going our way, some the other.

At 6:15am, long before the dawn.

2. Dawn

Under the trees it was dark, but the sky now had a hint of day. Ten minutes earlier it would have been treacherous here, but with the dawning light is was possible to see my feet as I ran alone on the trail along the lake.

From somewhere behind, there came an unfamiliar sound, "Thoop kwack thwish. Thoop kwack thwish."

I looked over my shoulder and out over the lake. Three scull boats came slicing thru the mirror-still water, the coxswains calling out the cadence, the crews moving forward and back in perfect synchrony, their boats making hardly a ripple.

I walked to the shore and stopped to watch. Three others came up behind me and stopped to watch, too. In seconds the boats had disappeared behind the trees upstream.

At 6:45am, just before the rising sun.

3. Morning Light

The sun had come up. With my run behind me, I sat and stretched with several dozen others who had just finished theirs.

Although the air was still cool, the light hitting my cheeks made my face warm.

I heard a shout come from out on the bridge. I raised my head to look. And as I looked up, a line of runners came filing off the bridge, one by one, thirty or so. An Austin-Fit running team. The leader called a halt, and they drank cold Gatorade from the RunTex jugs set out hours before.

Moments later, there was another team. And another. They kept coming and stopping to get something to drink and then continuing again along the trail. Team after team, thirty runners at a time, ten teams or so by the time they had all come and gone.

At 8:00am, with the sun rising over the skyline.

4. Going Home

And now it was day. Morning was well along. My run was done. I had rested some. My legs were stretched. It was time to go home.

I drove in silence, heading south, and came to that place where I often see the bikers going out for their morning ride.

And there they were, like last week and the week before and the week before that. Red jerseys. Blue jerseys. Yellow and green. Clusters of bikers drafting and passing and riding single-file, riding along the feeder road heading out the hills. Hundreds of them. Hundreds of them, going out for a weekend ride.

Just another morning in Austin.

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