Palm trees on the Canal

It's Sunday. We snoozed and Dexter'd, drank coffee and ate Netherlandish goodies left over from the holidays (long story!). A fine way to waste a day if you ask me, but then I got the urge to run so I did, into the dark. I had a route in mind so I set off with a water bottle and some thoughts to carry me through. And also "She's So Cold," which I'd heard just before the run and which buzzed endlessly through my brain like a fly caught in an empty glass.

Running outside at night gave me a different perspective of parts of the city that I usually only see during daylight hours. In one well-off neighborhood many large fir trees on lawns were adorned with soft white christmas lights which created a rich glow on the brick houses behind them. I also noticed fewer people about  - almost no one. During the day, the place seems rather geriatric and slow; at night, a grand neighborhood.

I thought a lot on this run about trust, at least from a writerly pov. Writers trust that readers will understand their images and phrases, and readers trust that authors will take them somewhere worthwhile. Not that every place is worthwhile, but some places are very good and worth more than others. 

For the first time this season I ran on the Canal with about a thousand skaters and considered how we trust that the ice will hold firm even as we make sharp cuts on its surface and jump on it, too. The ice won't crack and plunge us hypothermically into the water, and we won't stretch shaking hands the color of fish underbellies toward the large fake palm trees for leverage. Trust keeps us donning snow pants and tightening laces with gloved fingers and licking drips of nutella from steaming beaver tails. Trust keeps us coming back.