Chapter 2: I get lost and I almost get found

When I got home from school, I found my mother still unpacking boxes and arranging the living room. I headed up to my room and dropped off my books and school supplies. As there were no real classes today, there isn't any homework to be done. However, I do have a large list of school items I need to procure, it seemed like every class handed out a list. Even gym required that we use the school gym uniform, simple gym shorts from Sears would not do. I brought the lists back down stairs and discussed them with my mother. Mothers are used to these things so we simply built a consolidated list and she would take care of it. Except the gym clothes of course, those are sole sourced by the school.

The next item on my agenda was to set up my workout equipment and get in a good dose of sweat. I figured that would also help me to think more about the Kelly situation and possibly take out my frustrations. Our last house had a full basement which I pretty much had to myself. Unfortunately basements are not common in Louisiana, and our house was not an exception. We did have a two car garage, so I had assumed I could set my equipment up there. When I mentioned this to my mother, I was shocked to find that not only could I not set up my equipment in the garage, I needed to get it, and the rest of the boxes, out of the way so that the cars could be parked in there. Who ever heard of using a garage for parking cars?

"What? But if you're going to park both cars in the garage, where am I going to work out at?" I whined.

"We'll have to put up one of those carport things out back. For now just put everything on the back porch."

"The back porch is uncovered! Rain is very bad for metal, Mom!"

After a lot of back and forth it was determined that the most of the equipment could stay in the garage, but it would have to be stacked in a way that the cars could be parked inside. The rest could be stored in my closet or any other spare space I could find as long as she didn't have to look at it or trip over it. Apparently, someone had convinced my mother that tree sap was very bad here, and that if it touched her car, the paint would slide off and the car radio would never pick up any radio stations again! I'm sure there's a grain of truth to the tree sap woes, but my pointing out that there wasn't any trees over the driveway didn't seem to impact her resolve. There were plenty of trees around so I guess it's possible that some sap could be carried by the wind, but surely the problem was being overstated.

Two hours later I was very sweaty, but moving half a ton of weight lifting equipment isn't quite the same as getting a workout. Since I was already sweaty and Mom was in a little better mood after our "comprise", I checked with her that it was okay for an early evening run. Knowing how long my runs tend to be I was warned that I had to be home and cleaned up before supper. With a quick thumbs up, I was out the door. I knew she meant about 30 minutes, but figured I could get away with an hour since she wasn't specific.

Now, my fourteen year old self would have LOVED to strap on an MP3 player and some ear buds and jam to some rock through my run. However, no one had even heard of MP3s in 1981, they wouldn't appear until the early 90s. The Sony Walkman did exist, not the MP3 player, and not the CD player, but the very old school cassette tape player. Unfortunately, these were rather bulky to be carried while running, and I didn't own one anyway. Instead I got to listen to the barking dogs, cars passing by and the scream of little kids.

I didn't have a true plan to my run. It was a nice evening in the high 70s with a clear sky and a slight breeze. While it was still very humid, it was great weather for a run. I hadn't mapped out any mileage in my new neighborhood yet, I just figured I'd run at a reasonable slow pace of about an hour and that should be 5 or 6 miles. I did want to check out the park to see if it might be useful in my workouts. I love hill climbs and cross country running seems to cushion heels better then running on asphalt. I headed in that general direction, running up and down streets just to get a better feel for the place.

Most houses in our area were one story affairs with carports at one end. A smaller number, like ours, were two stories tall and/or had garages. From the street side view, we appeared to have one of the largest homes in the area. It wasn't outlandish, it was just a slightly larger home than the others I had seen. Almost all of the lots were around an acre, so there was plenty of space between houses and plenty of grass to cut. I wasn't looking forward to that part as I knew who was going to get that not-so-little job. Mowing wouldn't be bad with a riding mower, but all we had was a little push mower. With that much grass, the job could take up the whole weekend.

As I circled the final block before the park, I noticed a flutter of movement to my right. I just caught a glimpse of someone before a door slammed. It was a very cute someone, who appeared to be wearing a very small bathing suit. I didn't see a pool, but there was a chaise lounge, so they must have been laying out working on their tan. Unfortunately, I think I know who the cute someone was. While I couldn't be sure, with just a glance, it sure looked like Kelly. Suddenly I wished I had chosen a slightly different path. I figured with whatever just happened, there wasn't much I could do about it now, so I continued my run into the park.

The park was much larger than I expected, containing single track, off road running and mountain biking trails. Some of the trails had markings on them but most were unmarked and it looked like it would be very easy to get lost. I noted the angle of the shadows as I entered headed almost directly West, or at least into the evening sun.

After about 30 minutes of following circular trails I had become completely lost. I wasn't too concerned about that, as all trails lead to a trail head or road eventually, as long as I didn't actually run in circles. What did concern me was that I was getting very thirsty and the sun wasn't penetrating the trees well, making deep shows across the trails. I had gotten some water from a public fountain shortly after entering the park, but I hadn't seen another one since; nor another building, nor a paved road. I was also aware that I was probably already overdue back at my house, and it didn't look like I was getting anywhere fast.

It had been my intent to jog the width of the park then turn around and head back to the house by the shortest path. About 15 minutes ago I abandoned that idea and turned back East so that I would be back in time for dinner. The problem was that almost every path I took, circled me back around to the West again. A week from now I would follow the same route, and laugh at myself for missing the obvious turn offs back to the main park. I wasn't laughing now however. I didn't have any way to be sure, but it seemed that I wasn't making a lot of progress. This seemed like a good time to take a break and take stock of the situation.

As I stopped and looked around me I noticed that the trail I was on had a lot of pine needles and leaves, which probably meant that they were not frequently used. That was not too unusual with a park this size. I also hadn't seen any other runners or BMXers, so I didn't think waiting for someone to give directions was going to do me any good. In the distance to the south I could hear what sounded like a two cycle motorcycle. Since motorcycles were banned in the park, I thought that had to be a long ways away. I continued to look around until I noticed a straight line running through the trees. Those of you familiar with nature know that straight lines are unusual, and tend to indicate man made artifacts. If I was going to investigate I was going to have to leave the trail. That's the last thing you want to do when you're lost in the woods, but it seemed like a good gamble this time.

As carefully as I could I examined the woods around me in case I had to find my way back to the trail. Then I picked a land mark and walk directly to it in as close to a straight line as I could manage. As I got to the land mark I could tell I was right and the line I saw was a power line or phone line or some kind of line hanging from poles. It didn't really matter what kind of line it was as lines usually follow roads and roads lead to civilization, aka home. They were still a ways off, so I carefully picked another land mark and another as I made my way to them. I was making good progress but running shorts were not made to traverse open woodland, and my legs were getting majorly scratched up. Part way there, I crossed another trail and I had to duck through a barbed wire fence, so I thought I probably left the park property.