The mist that hangs

The mist that hangs

In the park where I've been jogging lately, since I started to care a little more about being alive, there seems to be something.. different. I'm at my keyboard trying to think of a category for it, or at least something to say I think it might be, but I just don't know. Every time I think I have a possible explanation, my mind decides that can't be it either. Having said all of that I'll just put down what happened.

I've been jogging and playing tennis a few times a week at this park for a couple months. It's right across the street from my place, has a running path, tennis and basketball courts, and those work out stations they have for sit ups, pull ups, etc. A lap around the park is .48 miles.

At around .35 miles, or near the nine on a clock looking from the top, it always seems colder. There are hedges on both sides of this part which could explain it, but not quite, it's a lot colder there than anywhere else in the park.

The coldness there first struck me as strange a few weeks ago when I finally geared up right and wore a windbreaker with sweats underneath; even then as I jogged this part I felt instantly cold then fine again as soon as I passed. Not normal. My body heat and clothes shouldn't have allowed such a quick drop and regaining of body temperature. I thought it was strange, but then hey, it's the next day already and not much to be done about it, I think you've had the feeling.

After tonight though I don't think I should jog in that park anymore. I don't think anyone should jog in that park anymore.

A few things happened all at once, my jogging partner threw his back out so we've skipped a few sessions, my car has been a problem which takes up time, and my electricity was shut off for nonpayment and my house is dark. I decided I should go work out.

Thermal and Tshirt, sweatpants, shoes and short socks, fine for a normal night but not a cold night. I run the first lap, it was cool but I felt fine, blood was flowing. I got to the cold spot, not only extra cold tonight but a mist was there between the hedges. I kept padding through. It wasn't only cold, I got the chills, like the 'something is off' chills. I passed the spot and made another round, stopping only for the pushups and slanted pullups.

Reading this, you might think I should have cut the workout short but I wasn't reading a story, I was out for a jog; I just brushed it off and kept going. The next time around I got to the cold, the mist was thicker, I seemed to be going slower. I was still jogging but the scenery just wasn't passing by as fast. The mist droplets seemed bigger, and they weren't just hanging in the hedges, they were filling the air around me.

Time went from what I've known my whole life, to what would be almost a complete stop in comparison. I noticed the mist wasn't just some random cloud but was in spirals and forms like a universe, or even a lot of universes. It seemed like I had plenty of time to look from one spinning galaxy to the next, and then down to little clusters of drops. I watched them spin and circle around and then go from being water droplets to having color.

Red and yellow suns, Blue green and brown planets around and between them, and grayish debris passing here and there. All of this in the most tiny miniaturization. I couldn't compare the size of my eyeballs to even the largest droplet, the same eyes I was looking at them with would be so humongous as to be ridiculous compared with this, but I had that thought just now and not then.

I was gone. There wasn't any me anymore. I could disappear and rearrange or congeal anywhere in this micro-starscape. I could focus in. I could look at a single tiny particle of mist and zoom down to the planet and the culture there, or the war, or the bleak ages between when there was nothing and when there was something.

I felt a pull on my body. I felt my body. I had my body back.

Someone was pulling on my clothes. I was only carrying my keys but someone was trying to get them.

I woke up and yelled 'hey', I stuck an arm out, someone ran off. I still had my housekeys on a shoelace that I take jogging instead of the full set. I was on the ground right there at the cold place. I got up and got home. I was freezing cold, I made a bath that burned my toes and sat in it refilling with hot water for 45 minutes before getting out and dried, and I still felt cold.