Evening run, post storm

Clouds rode horses or maybe they were tumbled bowling pins. They brought wind and obstinate thunder and flung branches and leaves down the street.

Luckily I left the truck windows down so I stood on the street, face to the wind, rain starting to fall, watching the circus arrive.

Later.

I don't run in the evenings, but it worked out that way. The storm pushed the heat from the ledge and the townspeople were coming out to identify the body of their former oppressor.

I say hello to everyone I pass by on a run. The shared smiles lighten the legs, I'm convinced, but that's not the reason.

J Dilla's "Donuts" is loud on the iPod, but not to block out sound, rather to stoke a shared journey. It's Dilla's opus--an album released three days before his death and that he worked to perfect, even from his hospital bed. It's a musical, spiritual journey, whose beats, rhythms, samples accompany and inhabit and send you. Each song may be like pulling a different donut from a box.

Dilla's vibes, the cool air, the puddles along the rail trail, the families and kids and dogs, all blend together as the heart rate climbs and sweat rolls.

Coming across Goldsborough Street, I think of sitting in the car as a kid and watching freight trains click by on this same path. I'm not that fast going by, or noisy, and cars don't generally stop.

My best runs are negative splits--I speed up as the run goes on, but that's been tougher with the heat and a lack of solid runs this summer. Today, thanks to storm, thanks to Dilla, thanks to trail greetings it all works and I finish spent but strong.

I walk inside, smiling and sweat covered, looking for coconut water, and Robin asks, "how was your run?"

Who's afraid of... Thelonious Monk??

I blame Schroeder. Sitting hunched over his cartoon piano, he rocked the tune "Linus and Lucy," which began in me a lifelong fascination with playing and listening to the piano. If I recall correctly, he was the first in an odd lineage of keyboard ticklers who have pulled me in an aesthetic tractor beam.

The list looks something like this: Schroeder. Rick Wakeman. Bill Thomas. Herbie Hancock. Thelonious Monk. Chris Merritt. Marco Benevento.

Some people dig guitar solos and I am no exception, letting Hendrix or Stevie Ray Vaughan wash over. Cliff Burton style bass solos? Absolutely. Neil Pert with a drum set spinning around him? Supercool. But it's always been the piano that has most captivated me and made me wish I could play it.

Wakeman owned the keys for the band Yes in their era of psychodelic album covers, Roundabout, and beyond and was the cat that opened the door to solos and jamming in the rock context. Bill Thomas caught my attention when I returned to Easton High from Hagerstown, first in a music history class, then AP Music theory, then helping out as a teacher's aide my senior year. When he sat down at the piano to give us examples, he took no small amount of breaks hearing, "Hey Mr. Thomas, can you play 'Linus and Lucy' again?" He generally rolled his eyes, hunched his shoulders and appeased us (me), breaking out the notes that make you want to do the Snoopy dance.

Herbie Hancock's "Rockit" put him on the popular teenage conscious map when we were in middle school, but it wasn't until I heard his stuff prior to getting synthesized that he pulled me in. I like Miles and Mingus as much as any jazz cats, but Hancock and Monk and hearing the keyboards roll through improvisation and form somehow sends me in ways that horns, sax or bass doesn't always achieve.

In the last couple years, we've stumbled across (or been encouraged to check out) a number of bands. But it's been the live performances of Chris Merritt and, this past Tuesday, Marco Benevento, that have elevated themselves and me above the fray.

Which brings me somehow here. I often challenge myself with physical/mental goals. Can I run a marathon? Can I finish the JFK 50-miler? Can we paddle from Easton to Oxford or around Wye Island? Can I swim from Oxford to Bellevue? Can I skateboard for 50 or 100 miles? Our pal Landy Cook, en route to completing the 4+ mile Chesapeake Bay swim heard a lady say that she tried to do something that got her both excited and scared every year. I like that idea. But I don't think it always has to be a physical challenge.

I am not musically inclined. I'm also not internationally known or known to rock the microphone, but I digress. For me, I think that one of those exciting and scary challenges, one that I've wanted to get my hands on and into for some time is to learn to play the piano.

I don't hold delusions of grandeur or set high hopes for myself. I don't want to sit in with a band or play Carnegie Hall (or NightCat for that matter). I will start with a goal. Learn to do something I've wanted to be able to do since watching the Charlie Brown Christmas special as a kid. Learn to play "Linus and Lucy."

But just the same, I think I'll go with the Bill Murray as Bob Wiley philosophy: baby steps ;)