Between my sweethearts

I thought of them before I fell asleep last night, and of them again on the way to work, and I am tempted to dump them both. I am afraid that having too much information will spoil the romance of the run, and the experience of the run will be reduced to a mere statistic. Will I be distracted from the "here and now" if I have a constantly changing number on my wrist, yelling "Speed up! Too slow! Too short!"

There is the "science" of running: speed, distance, hills, repeats, time, improvement; and there is the "art": the breeze, the sound of the foot on gravel, the sweat, the regular breathing, the feeling of your heart as you push yourself just a little harder. Runner's World has a column "Waddle on, friends" for those who take it slow, and in the last issue I read, the columnist was emphatic in saying that no two runs are every alike, the way you can never put your foot in the same river twice. That is what I am afraid of losing.

I think I think too much.