The Run to Nowhere

As we gathered under the picnic shelter this morning, the staff prepared to go on a run. The XO asked if everybody had their ID Cards; he wanted to run off post.

All of us assumed that we would be running out one certain gate, but as we began to run—this clearly was not the case. We began to run up a steep hill and I began to stiffen up. We soon ran down the hill, through a gate as the downhill became steeper and longer. Then my thought was; “What goes down must go back up!”

Deeper into the valley we went. Until we came to a turn, which would takes us up again. This hill was steep and around a curve. As the hill finally came to an end and I reached the top, we began to go down the other side.

Once again, I began to say: “What goes down must go back up!” The back side of this hill was steep and long. About half way down, I heard the XO say; “When we get to the turnaround point, we will do a release run back.” (Which means, we will all run back through the same route up all of the hills at our own pace.)

We were nearing what I was sure to be the turnaround point, when he ran to a military van and opened the door. Luckily, he also opened the other doors for us as well and didn’t just drive off.

So we all piled in to the van and rode back to post. It was a nice surprise.

Interestingly enough, the XO remind me of a blog post that I wrote a couple of weeks ago about our morning PT sessions. One of the comments mentioned that we must be “stressed” in never knowing what we will do for PT. He thinks ambiguity is a good thing.

So, this morning, we ran to nowhere.