I live near a nature preserve. Which is a fancy way for a city to say that the civil engineers told the city planners that under no circumstances could you build on this land because it will flood every year. Therefore, the city handed the “worthless” land to the parks and rec department to build a nature preserve. I use the nature preserve term lightly because I am pretty sure the only wildlife they are preserving are mosquitos, which unless you reference Lilo and Stich, mosquitos are no endangered species nor are they worth breeding in the copious amounts that they do in this nature preserve.

Despite the mosquito invasion, this park has great running trails through the woods. And being conveniently close to my house I utilize these trails to go on runs. But only at sunrise and sundown. Partially because those are the prettiest times of day, but mostly because this is Texas and I may die if I run in the middle of the day.

I am about a ¾ of a mile into my run when I cross paths with a fellow female runner, but I don’t really bat an eye to this because there are a lot of people on the trail. However, a lot of people turn into a few people about a half mile later as we are deeper in the woods. This is when I begin to notice that the female has been about 10 steps ahead of me this whole time. I begin to think it’s a little odd that we are at the same pace and heading in the same direction.

A short time later she begins to also notice me, a 6 foot 4, 200-hundred-pound man of solid “muscle” following her through the woods. And from her constant glances back I begin to realize that given the situation of being in the woods, at sundown, and being a big guy, that she probably is a little on edge with me coincidentally following her.

So not wanting to be an accidental stalker I begin to slow my pace. But not a moment later she begins to slow her pace. So now we are both walking and I am thinking that short of wearing a sweatshirt I could not get any creepier. I decide that I should just tough it out and pass her up on the trail. However, the moment I go to start running again she turns her head, sees that I am now also walking, and takes off running again at a considerably faster pace than before. Making me the stalker in the park.

So if you happened to be running in the woods last week and thought that a creepy man was following you, rest assured it was an accident and I am sorry. But we would make great running partners seeing as we kept pace on accident for an entire mile.

So remember to make good choices, don’t follow people into the woods because they may think you are stalking them, hit that follow button, share if you like what I said, comment if you have something to add, and I will see you on Thursday.