The little things make all the difference these days.

While my 15K race and my 10 mile hike scheduled for mid-May and early June, respectively, have yet to be canceled, I hold out little hope that they will actually be held.

Still, I continue to train. Because even if they’re canceled, I can still run a 15K on race day, even if it’s doing loops around my neighborhood and having the neighbors think I’m insane. The 10-mile hike is supposed to be an adventure with my husband, but even if we miss that, either because of cancelation or because he’s still working on a COVID-19 unit, I know that missing out now means we will live to hike another day.

My running routes have been close to home. A few times I’ve driven 2 miles to a nearby nature trail to run on dirt. It has started to become repetitive, so in an attempt to counteract the boredom, I take a moment each run to notice something in my surroundings.

I hear a bird singing. The sun suddenly breaks through clouds. A flower has opened.

Life as we know it may have changed, been put on PAUSE as we’re told here in New York State, but life still goes on. The birds have no idea that there’s a pandemic in the human world. The trees still have buds turning into leaves and sap flowing through their trunks. Flowers still bloom. Nature is still coming alive, as it does every spring, continuing the rhythm of the earth, unaware of what’s been deemed essential and non-essential. Nature continues to change.

And our life has changed because life is change. This is true with or without a global pandemic.

Running may be a constant overall theme in my life, but it’s full of change, too. It’s changed over the 12 years I’ve been running. It changes from day to day. Heck, some days it changes within a run itself!

This PAUSE has reminded me to take a look at those little things. The sun. The trees. The flowers. Looking at those has allowed me to look at the little things on my run. My breathing. My arm swing. My posture. The feel of the pavement versus the feel of the trail. Grimacing through a head wind and smiling when the wind turns to my back.

I still keep track of my mileage as part of my training plan, but I’m less interested in paces and performance and productivity these days. I’m more interested in experiences, in noticing what’s going on around me and within me.

For that, I take a cue from nature that keeps on changing all around me, just like it always has.