Puddles

Lunchtime in South Carolina. Shirt off. Hat down. Sweat soaking into the driveway. Run two of the day.

My shirt hangs heavy. My hat curls at the brim. The puddle they leave behind is its own kind of proof.

I was here. I put in the work.

None of this is convenient. I wake before sunrise to buy back time. The alarm goes off at five. Sometimes earlier. Depends on how the night went. How the baby slept. How the baby didn’t.

The house is quiet when I move. I slide out of bed slowly, careful not to creak the frame. I grab my clothes and shoes in the dark. Tiptoe through the room, avoiding bins and chair legs. If I wake up Sega, the morning’s done.

If the night before went well, the bottles are already mixed. I drink. I stretch. A few leg swings in the hallway. Then I’m out the door, chasing the next puddle.

Summer’s here. The air is thick. The miles are stacking.

My wife takes the hardest shifts. She lets me chase this thing. This shape I’m carving with my feet. Just motion. Just miles. Just bricks laid before the world wakes up.

That’s what this is. Brick by brick. Run by run. Sweat into concrete.

Some mornings, I stare at the floor and think about going back to bed.

Most days, one run isn’t enough, so I cram in a second. Lunch break. Post-work. After dinner. After Sega is down. That’s the window. That’s when the road calls.

Some days I don’t want to answer. I still do.

There’s a kind of pride you only get from doing the thing no one sees. No crowd. No race bib. No credit. Just me and the road. Just the quiet win of not quitting.

I wring out the shirt. I remember the heat. The pace. The silence. The push. The weight I carried and left behind in slow drips across the asphalt.

I sweat heavy on a light day. On days like this, I leave a trail behind me.

But I show up anyway. Each run adds a brick to a wall I may never finish.

That’s fine with me. I’m not just building a wall. I’m building into myself.

I’ve got a wife who believes in me. A teenager who’s watching. A baby who will grow up remembering the rhythm of early mornings. The door closing. The water running. The steady thud of shoes on pavement.

This training isn’t a phase. It’s not a midlife whim. It’s a structure I’m building. A body I’m testing. A future I’m shaping.

I don’t know how far this goes. But I want to find out.

And when I do, I’ll be standing in a puddle like this one. Shirt soaked. Breath heavy. Still moving.

Still laying bricks. Still betting on the build.