The Sound of Summer

I begrudgingly participated in exercise this morning. Don’t get me wrong—I looked for many reasons to politely decline, but it was a mild 71° at 8 o’clock am here in Kentucky, so the weather wouldn’t provide me with a reasonable excuse.  Neither would any imagined or real injuries.  Nor would I be able to claim less-than-adequate REM since according to my husband, I was sound asleep by 10pm and I return your attention to the moment of deliberation—8am.  You do the math, I already exercised today.

Corey,  in his determination to come in at Army required weight allowance, had left with the beagle and I quickly calculated that I had approximately 12-15 minutes before he’d been one lap around his usual course to meet him.  After donning the appropriate foot and body requirements for a jog, I set out to “surprise” him and offer my company for his morning jog (read: give him an excuse to slow his pace.)

It was on the quarter mile stretch to the bike path from our house that I heard it, The Sound of Summer.  I must describe first the overcast heavy air that surrounded me for you to hear what I heard.  The sun’s light strained behind a wall of clouds preventing it from producing any shadows on the ground.  One by one, I picked up the rhythm of my shoes meeting the pavement in a squishy, labored sort of song.  I heard it in the brassy timbre emitting from a fellow jogger’s headphones as she and I passed each other on the way.  I wondered what song was providing her motivation to keep going.  A lonesome sounding bird was cooing to my left in the wooded area across the street.  And though I couldn’t hear it, I’m sure a deer lifted its head in awareness of the vibrations of potential predators nearby and, satisfied, returned to snacking on the abundant undergrowth.  Behind me, the soft crackle and whirring of a bicycle’s wheels caught up with me as an 8 year old boy passed me on his bike.  I silently approved him for wearing his helmet, whether or not it was his idea.  In the background, critters chirped, clicked, and scurried, barely audible, providing a layer of mood music for an oblivious audience.  I passed another jogger with headphones in her ears.

Up ahead, I saw my husband rounding out the first lap of his jog, followed by our beagle panting with tongue hanging out eager to sniff, investigate, and mark every vertical object he encountered.  “I thought you might like some company,” I offered. 

He smiled.