I was running. You were walking.

Mr. Applegate & Joe
Damn Yankees - Bay High School, 1985.
I am smoking a lit cigarette on stage.

Went out for drinks with an old friend last night, someone I hadn't really spoken to in about thirty years or so. It was good to see Rob, if you looked at him you'd say he is a middle-aged lawyer with gray hair, and you'd be right. He has gentle eyes and a kind voice. A good guy. That's also the way I have always thought of him, and I was comforted by the fact that we share so many thoughts about things, especially considering how many ways I think differently from when I was in high school. Sometimes I am afraid to earn what the people I used to know now believe.

We're both Bay Village expatriates, each of us chose Cleveland Heights after college and feel so much more at home here. Our children were raised here, they will tell their children they are from here. It is quite a different world.

We ran into each other at a street fair years ago and said we'd catch up, but it took years. Facebook helped, he proposed a meeting and I said yes, and it finally happened. First the Wine Spot, then we moved to Brennan's. Heights!

Facebook cuts down on small talk. How many people do we know from high school, from college, from other jobs, who we used to date or were even once married to, who we may acknowledge or interact with only briefly, over years ... and yet, they know how old our children are, if we have been through a major illness, where we are and where we have been?

I didn't need to tell Rob my father had died, he knew already. (Strange, I keep finding myself surprised by people who I see every day who I surprise with the news, and only because they don't use Facebook.) We were talking about my half marathon, and the terrible weather, and how I have become this runner guy, and how impressed he was by my dad because he didn't look like a runner, and yet he was always heading out to run.

Rob said, "He'd run at night," meaning my dad, and that surprised me, so much, because I'd never thought about it. I mean, I couldn't picture him going out to run. Certainly not at night. If you asked, I couldn't tell you when he would take his runs. Only makes sense, he left for work before dawn, and came home in time for dinner. But honestly, I never thought about it.

But Rob could picture it. He described my home as a cool place to be, we'd hang out, my parents were nice to talk to, we'd watch TV all hours, it was great. And Dad would take off, maybe ten o'clock at night to go running. Sometimes I do that, too.

Distance: 3 miles
Route: Forest Hill Loop

We're in it for the duration now, the summer weather. Stepping onto Euclid Avenue last evening, people in the streets in shirt sleeves, so many people. The city is alive again.

Temperature: 70°
Climate: hot!
Weight: 163 lbs.
Mood: good

Spring 2016 Playlist
Send My Love (To Your New Lover) * - Adele
Wedding  - Poliça
Angels * - Chance the Rapper ft. Saba
Go! - M83 ft. Mai Lan
Born Again Teen * - Lucius
Breathe Life - Jack Garratt

Yes, Adele's new single could be performed by Taylor Swift. I don't care, I don't care!

Warmdown
Voices In My Head * - Bob Mould