MACE

I now own a little hand held canister of pepper spray, complete with a comfortable hand strap so that it's easy to hold.  When worn correctly, the word "MACE" shows on the outside of my hand, so that any approaching mayhem starters will be psychologically overcome before they are physically overcome, and will think twice before attacking me.  In the event that it is a mountain lion who attacks, I hope that I get the one lone mountain lion who can read, and then retreat with it's tail between it's legs back to the rocky craggy cave like hideout from which it originally sprung itself the moment it sensed my presence.  I made sure I knew how to properly use the little hand held spray canister, in hope that I will never have to use it.  My husband gave me a pepper spray tutorial.  He said "you can't just sort of spray it and shriek and run away; you have to keep spraying it directly into the person's eyes until he is incapacitated." he said "Pretend you're me, I know you can do it."  He also said "You are basically armed with a weapon."  I told my husband, "I really don't think anything will happen to me on the trail, because when I run, God goes with me, and there are a whole lot of angels that surround me."  He smiled at me and said something like "that's nice, take the pepper spray."

When I was a very young child, my father used to say to me, "If anyone ever tries to hurt you, poke him in the eyes."  and he demonstrated by pushing two pointed fingers into the air in front of him so I would know the proper eye poking technique. 

So far I have never had to poke anyone in the eyes.  I'm glad because aside from the obvious reasons, eye poking feels much too personal and squishy.  I don't even touch the eyeballs of people that I like.  At least with pepper spray, I can keep a ten to twelve foot distance.

     So armed with my weapon of choice this morning, I added a mile on to my usual run, the first half of which was a steep uphill incline with sharp curves.  What enticed me was the sign at the base of the hill which read "Steep incline and sharp curves, next .5 miles."  I reasoned that if I ran to the summit, I'd have to run back down, which would be exactly 1 mile, and then I could say that I'd done it, which is my favorite reason of all, and the downhill part would be easy, and then I could finish my usual run.  I also reasoned that my 20 year old self would have run it even without pepper spray and without question, because my 20 year old self was just a little bit more naive and insane than my 36 year old self. 

 But not much. 

 I don't mind that. 

-XOXO,