A Man Went Running in the Night

A man went running in the night. With no shirt, no shoes and just enough of a pair of shorts to keep him from being arrested, he stepped out into the warm darkness and led his unleashed dog up two blocks to the elementary school playground, where the two of them began to run hard, up and down the grassy length of the soccer field. He had worked long and late that day—he had done this all week—and it had left him feeling tired, lonely and pent-up, on top of the lingering soreness of his recent divorce. He had to do something with himself, and running near-naked across the grass was what felt best among the available options. He ran fast, until he was glazed with sweat and breathing hard, then he walked, then he kept running and walking until he was worn out and ready for bed. He covered a figure-eight path across the field, looping around each goalpost before heading to the far side of the opposite post, thereby crossing his own trail in the middle of the field. He did this the next night after work, and the grass began to appear worn where his feet had repeatedly trod. He did it again for several nights on end, until a bare figure-8 path was clearly visible. After a couple of weeks, the path became a slightly sunken rut.

It was mid-summer; school was out, and few people were around to notice anything unusual in the schoolyard. A few dog-walkers and frisbee-throwers frequented the grounds, but those who noticed anything tended to look at the path curiously for a few seconds and then walk on. The maintenance man who mowed the grass every week saw it, but said nothing, following his personal policy of not asking questions and making more work for himself. No one had ever seen how this path was made, since the man did all his running very late at night, when all the neighborhood was either asleep or bleary-eyed in front of TVs and smart phones. And so, he continued on, undisturbed in the activity that had become both obsession and meditation for him.

But his activity couldn’t go on unnoticed; school started up again in August, and children never miss anything that’s out of place. At recess on the first day of classes, the children crowded around this strange new feature in their familiar landscape. Suddenly, the swings and playsets were of no interest to them. When the teachers on playground duty came to see what the fuss was all about, they were enthusiastically shown what had previously escaped all official notice. Before recess ended, the school principal had joined the crowd, interrogating the maintenance man, who stood staring at the ground, shaking his head and thinking to himself, “Aaah, shit.”

By evening, of course, every school parent had heard about the mysterious “great big eight” from their children. After a flood of inquiries to the school office about this curious and unexplained phenomenon, a special meeting of the Parent-Teacher Association was called during which all the known facts were presented and questions and concerns were aired. This had to be done in order to quell the fears of the community, for speculation as to the origin of the figure-eight path had run wild in a very short time. Some posited that a coalition of Satanists, transgender activists and Antifa had made the playground a meeting place. Others were quite sure that the “X” where the paths crossed was a target for terrorist planes. Inevitably, space aliens were mentioned; it had gotten that far out of hand.

So, before a packed meeting room, the school principal and the head of maintenance presented everything they knew about the mystery path, plus plenty of filler, because what they knew was next to nothing. When the parents got their chance to speak—and many did—their statements were filled with worry, apprehension and suspicion that the truth was being withheld from them. Some were downright angry; one father declared, “If there’s gonna be any sort of symbol out there on the soccer field, it oughta be an American flag. I pay taxes to this school district and to this country. We have brave men and women in our armed forces protecting our right to landscape our school grounds as we see fit.” One mother, equally agitated, stated, “The figure-eight is a pagan symbol for infinity, and I don’t want my kids asking questions about this sort of New-Age wokeism.”

The meeting had to be adjourned before everyone got a chance to speak, but a decision was reached that, for now, an emergency fund would be tapped to pay for the eradication of all traces of the path and the safeguarding of the school grounds from further disfigurement. Thirty thousand dollars was set aside to poison all the grass on the soccer field, bring in truckloads of dirt to fill the path, cover the field with fresh sod (which would have to be watered daily), and put up security gates, surveillance cameras and “No Trespassing” signs at all entrances to the playground. The children would spend recess indoors for at least a month until the playground could be deemed safe again.

Meanwhile, the man continued his nightly running. He was becoming more fit, both mentally and physically. The running afforded him time to think through his problems. He began to figure out some things about himself and his own behaviors that had long baffled him. He realized to what extent life had been living him, rather than the other way around, and for the first time in his life, he started setting goals based on what he wanted, rather than on what he thought others wanted for him.

And still, he ran unseen. Even though the night janitor crew had been instructed to keep an eye on the playground, they noticed nothing. The man did his running well after midnight, when the janitors’ shift ended. He himself was blissfully unaware of the ruckus his activity had raised. He was working so much in those days, he was little more than a ghost to his neighbors.

The night he found about the school’s concern and subsequent plan of action started as just another night of stepping out of the house and leading his dog two blocks up the street to the walkway that would lead them to their running ground. But this time, he was met by a tall, padlocked fence at the schoolyard border under a newly-installed, harsh, metal-halide lamp and a video camera. A strong stench of herbicide caused him to reel as he read a new sign warding off tresspassers and guaranteeing their prosecution. His dog whimpered and padded about in confusion. The man put his hand over his nose and mouth, his eyes stinging and tearing as he stared uncomprehendingly at the fence, and, almost of their own will, his feet walked slowly backwards, away from the smell of poison. And then, once he got over his initial shock and acknowledged the finality of the barrier before him, he turned around and led his dog back home, not sleeping that night or for several nights afterward.

It was during that week he began drinking again.