Running Central Park
A quick note before you read this one
Found this sitting in my notes the other day. Wrote it back in January, fresh off the run, and never did anything with it. I almost let it stay buried. But the point in it is still true, relevant no matter the date. So here it is, a little late.
It's January 2nd, and I'm in New York City, ringing in the new year and looking forward to what's ahead. Last time I was here, in 2024, I got run down with the flu and never felt right the whole trip. When I left, I made myself a promise: next time I'm in New York, I'm running Central Park.
Here I am. A few days into the new year, staying at a hotel on 57th and 7th, three blocks from the park. The weather: 22 degrees. I said I was going to do it, and by God, I was going to do it.
The Buildup
The two days before, we'd walked all over the city. Rockefeller Plaza, Times Square, the obvious stops, plus a few off the beaten path. Cold, frigid, exactly the New York you picture. But today was different. I laid my clothes out the night before. This morning, 8:30 sharp, I was lacing up for Central Park, running a route my AI assistant had mapped out for me.
I told myself I'd do the bare minimum. I ended up running almost five miles, past the Guggenheim, the Met, along the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis reservoir trail. Honestly, the run itself wasn't the hard part. The hard part was everything before it: hyping myself up, agonizing over what to wear, watching my wife get ready before me. I'd made this promise to myself for a reason. I've got the Gate River Run and the Donna 5K coming up in Jacksonville, and I needed this.
The Gift
The real win wasn't the mileage. It was killing the excuse "it's too cold." I ran in 22 degrees. Not my fastest, not my slowest, slow enough to actually take it in.
Now I'm on the Staten Island Ferry heading back to Manhattan. It's 29 degrees, only seven degrees warmer, but it feels completely different. Layered up on the ferry deck, that same cold that stopped me for months doesn't register as cold at all anymore.
The Point
Nothing about the temperature changed. My reference point did. That's the whole thing about the excuses we make. They're rarely about the actual conditions, they're about where we're measuring from. Today was a gift I gave myself: proof that "too cold" was never really about the cold, and one less excuse standing between me and showing up.
