Alarm clocks and breakfast

I’ve never been one to run with headphones. Putting aside the safety issue for a moment – I’d rather be able to hear traffic coming than a thumping bassline – I just like listening to all the sounds around me on a run: birds, dogs, people I pass, even cars and lawnmowers. I like having all my senses alive to the same experience.

Most weekdays I get up early and run before work. My route varies. Some days I run along or around Lake Union and the Burke-Gilman, not near anything especially residential. But most days I end up putting in my miles around Capitol Hill, the neighborhood where I live, past extravagant houses and apartment buildings filled with art kids. And at 6:30 in the morning these residences all have one thing in common: the chorus of alarm clocks that greets me as I run past.

On my usual morning runs, I hear alarm clocks (more people prefer beeps to radios, in case you were wondering); smell coffee, toast, and occasionally eggs and breakfast meat; and see people walking their dogs and trucks making early morning deliveries. I don’t taste much other than my own toothpaste, and what I feel is chiefly my feet hitting the ground beneath me, and when the winter comes the main thing I’ll see are bedroom and kitchen lights being switched on. Mostly early morning runs are more about hearing and smelling, alarm clocks and breakfast.