I never expected, or wanted, to see a penis on my afternoon run. But one day I did and it’s a day I’ll never forget. I started this run in the late afternoon, with the skies foreboding rain. I was in college and organic chemistry and physics lay heavy in my brain, necessitating the kind of stress relief only pounding up and down hilly dirt trails can bring. Lacing up my shoes, I could feel anticipation pulsing through my body. I was an addict and about to get my fix. My physical and mental being craved something— endorphins; meditation; simple, rhythmic movement—that running satiated. Of course, sometimes I had to drag myself out the door, reminding myself of how good I would feel afterwards, or how I could write off chocolate chip cookie calories if I go for at least half an hour, but today it was an effortless ritual.
The rain started to fall as I headed to the hills. My destination was the Fire Trail, a challenging route tucked into the Berkeley hills. No one else was out—rain tends to weed the weak--and I was buoyed by my perseverance in the face of wet weather. I wasn’t on the trail for more than fifteen minutes—just getting into my stride, enjoying the smell of wet dirt from the new rain—when I saw him. He was facing the mountainside with his hands cupped at his waist; a hiker that had stopped to take a piss. As I ran past I noticed he was about my age, wearing hiking boots, a rain jacket, and tan corduroys. I kept going, heading up the hill. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the man turn and follow me. Not unusual, I thought, except that he was running. I stayed my course, trying to casually glance back. I had seen no one else on the trails, and did not expect to: by this time the rain was coming down hard and the sun was setting. “Excuse me!” he shouted. He was close, about ten feet away. I turned. My heart was pounding, more from fear and adrenaline than the running. I was scared. “Yes?” I responded “Look, I’m, uh….I like have a problem and was wondering if you could help me out. I’m trying to jack off and I can’t and my balls really hurt. I was, uh, wondering if you could like help me out?” In the movies, this is where you would see the woman’s adrenaline laden thoughts scurrying past the screen. Did she tell her roommates where she had gone? When would they notice her absence? Could she outrun him? How long would it take them to find her body in the bushes? Would her remains be eaten by a mountain lion? Is this guy joking? What did he did just say to me? My response was weird. I held my hands up as if I was being threatened at gunpoint. “Look man, I’m just going for a run here man, just a run. I just want to finish my run, man.” My excessive use of the word man, in retrospect, was also weird. Was I trying to make him my bro? Make him realize that I was really quite dude- like and not worthy of sexual assault? Or was I just being honest? I mean, I really was just going for a run, just trying to work out my own demons and angels and ideas and didn’t want to help some pervert with his. I whirled around and started to sprint up the hill. “Just one second, one more thing,” he pleaded. I turned around to see him standing there with his dick hanging out of his pants. “Do you like it?” the sinister directness of his question made my head spin. I was out of there. My legs, my beautiful, strong, trusty legs, hauled me as fast as they could to the end of the trail.
I have never, and probably will never, run as fast as I did that day. I ran to the end of the trail, to pavement, to houses, to people and to all things familiar. My face was wet from rain and my hands were shaking. Finally turning back, I saw the same tan stretch of dirt I had always seen, the same oak and the same eucalyptus. He was nowhere to be seen. I kept running, down the curvy road back to my house. “Fuck!” I screamed out loud. “Fuck!” Over and over and over, all the way home. I was no longer scared, I was pissed. Fuck that man for making me feel afraid, on MY trail, in MY city, in MY backyard. Fuck him for taking his weird pathos and dragging it from its dark corners and into MY life. Fuck him for making me scared, to this day, of running alone on trails.
I never wanted to see a penis on my afternoon run. But I did and have managed to reclaim that section of the Fire Trail over and over and over again. I run it alone, trying to confront my fears and disprove my over active imagination. These are my trails and fear has only made me faster.