SLOWLY BUT STEADILY: A box turtle on the Barnegat Branch Trail is one of the author’s little discoveries that motivate her to keep going. (Photo courtesy of Robin Lentz Worgan)
I spend my summers on LBI. This summer I’m committed to finding a dirt trail off the island to run on, as I’m training for a trail run and writing retreat in September. Trail running is a type of running that takes place in nature.
Just before Memorial Day weekend, while driving my dog to Barnegat Animal Clinic, I came across a sign for the Barnegat Branch Trail (BBT). I decided to give it a try. On my first run there, I was blown away by its beauty. According to a sign along the trail, construction began in 2007. It is 15.6 miles long and was built along the New Jersey Central Railroad line that runs from Barnegat to Toms River. This well-trodden but well-maintained, mostly gravel trail is surrounded by trees on both sides, which provide me with plenty of shade as I run.
Having not run for 15 years and starting trail running two years ago, I need constant distraction to stay motivated and positive. My mind tells me, “You’re tired, you’re old, you’re thirsty, your knee hurts.” On several runs on the BBT, I keep myself going during difficult moments by enjoying my natural surroundings, especially the trees. Some I recognize, some I don’t, but many are labeled. I pass red cedars and pitch pines, but also sassafras, black cherries, and magnolias. On several mornings, I spot some of God’s creatures—squirrels, toads, a white-tailed deer, and plenty of friendly rabbits—scurrying about.
When I jog every day, the best distraction is right in front of me. I get into the habit of running 3-4 miles in one direction, then turning around and running the exact same route back. But then a few weeks ago at BBT, I heard myself saying out loud, “I’m so bored on this run.” (Oh no!)
During the winter months, I run on trails in Fairmount Park in Philadelphia, near my house. I run up hills, have constant elevation changes, and have to focus on the path directly in front of me or I might trip over a root or rock. It’s always exciting because I take a different route every day.
That excitement I feel every morning as I embark on a new path reminds me of how I feel about my writing projects. I’ve been a writer for 30 years, and I’m always excited when I start a new project. Beginnings, especially for those of us with wild imaginations, are fertile, and it feels like the start of an adventure. I don’t know where my pen or my laptop will take me. Yet my “new” essays often never make it past the first or second draft. The fact is, I find it much harder to get back into work on a long-term project, like my novel that I’ve been working on for years, than to simply start something new.
Nanowrimo is National Novel Writing Month, held each November. Writers sign contracts in an online community to write every day and produce a novel outline or work on a novel every day of the month. This summer, I decided to work on my novel for an hour every day in August. So far, I’ve done that for two weeks, but the excitement of the “newness” of this project has long since worn off, making it hard for me to get back into it most days. But when I sit down with a cup of tea and a pen, I’m rewarded with an epiphany about a character, a resolution to a scene, or even the accomplishment of having written a flowing sentence.
As I run the BBT, I hear myself complaining three or four times a week about how this path is always so monotonous, but then I realize that staying true to this path is like staying true to my writing.
When my children were little and told me they were bored, I always replied, “Boredom makes you creative.” When they accepted their boredom, they suddenly invented a new game, a laundry basket became a boat under the falling blossoms of our cherry tree, a coffee table became a stage for singing.
I have reread pages of my novel so many times that it is difficult to see it with fresh eyes, but if I meditate, clear my mind and read a page out loud as a reader, not a writer, and remain curious and open, I will discover something new. The same goes for the discipline of walking the same route back and forth several days a week; it teaches me to look for something new in my external environment and in my inner mind. The BBT always offers something new. Every time I walk, I wave at smiling people walking, jogging, or biking by. Just as I start to pant and try to distract myself from my fatigue by thanking each of my 57-year-old body parts for helping me walk, and then thanking every single object in my field of vision (sky, grass, earth, pine needles), I think I have nothing left to see when suddenly I spy a turtle crossing my path or smell the sweet scent of a pepper bush with its white flowers spiraling upward.
Sometimes when I run, I also get lost in the flow and start to delve into my inner world and think about the main character of my novel, 16-year-old Tanner. I’m constantly trying to get to know her better, and while I run, I put her in different situations with other characters and see how she reacts, making sure her emotional truth is present throughout the novel. And when I’ve had enough of that, or a thought comes to me that satisfies me, I come back to the present and see a chipmunk emerge from a hole in the road, or I notice a blooming mimosa tree, its pink flowers glowing in the morning sun.
When I was 16, my brother and I ran a mile around Surf City every day while practicing for football and field hockey. We were oblivious to our surroundings as we sprinted past landmarks like Fella’s Pizza, The Big Dipper, and the Ship’s Galley Pancake House. When we finished, my grandmother stood outside her pink house, glowing like the pink mimosa, and called us in to eat soft-boiled eggs before the summer sun slid up and reached the heat of the day.
Back then, our goal was speed, but 40 years later, my goal is to notice the beauty around me. I walk slowly enough to hear the birds and cicadas and say good morning to everyone I pass.
A woman my age and her mother take turns walking the dog, the mother taking over the leash toward the end of the walk. A man I often pass tells me he didn’t take his dog today because it’s too hot and his dog is old. A father and son walk together, the father encouraging the tired boy. So much love everywhere. I don’t want to miss a thing. Staying curious and an observer pays off in both endeavors. If I stay on the trail with both my book and my legs, it will pay off.
Recently I stopped at the GNM Coffee Shop on Route 9 after my run to work on my novel, but instead I wrote this piece, but wait – oops – I’m off chasing something new and adventurous again. So, I’ll see you later, because I need to be disciplined and get back to working on my novel, be open to its beauty and its flaws, and find my way to completion and publication.
In the meantime, I hope to see you some morning on the Barnegat Branch Trail.
Robin Lentz Worgan of Flourtown, Pa., and Harvey Cedars is the author of Recording Mom’s Grief in a Diary: A Book and Diary for Mothers After a Stillbirth or the Loss of a Child (2010).
