I'm slowly building up my street cred as one of the regular eccentrics at the dirt track where I run. It's only a couple blocks away from my apartment, and it's attached to Clark Kerr, the dormitory with the highest proportion of student athletes, which is why they also get a soccer pitch, a baseball diamond, and some tennis courts. It's pretty convenient to do laps there, and the dirt is nice and soft enough for me to run barefoot, which is a habit I've taken to as of late.
Yeah, I'm that guy.
I'd say that demographic breakdown of the other people who use the track goes something like this: about half students, a quarter middle-aged Berkeleyites, and a quarter senior citizen power-walkers.
And then there's the other crazy. If I get to be Barefoot Guy, then I'd like to refer to the other crazy as Rambo. Rambo likes to do his laps in the mid-morning, just as I do, and I seem to see him every time that I go out to the track. I'm pretty sure he's out there everyday, judging by the crumpled tissue paper texture of his skin and the fact that he's browner than me. He brings his dog along, and lets him hang out in the shade near the aluminum bleachers. He always wears cut-off muscle shirts that bear only the manliest of logos, like Everlast, which I like to imagine implies his past boxing career. That would explain his massive guns. He runs with knees braces on both legs and weight-lifting gloves. Finally, there's the headband, for which I give him his namesake. No, he doesn't wear a bandana, because bandanas are for hipster pussies. No, Rambo is fucking hardcore, and only a torn strip of plaid flannel, quite possibly leftover from the aforementioned hipster pussies that he eats for breakfast, has adequate sweat-wicking properties. Oh, and he wears a tape-player, not a Sony Walkman but a knockoff, for his tunes. I assume he loops a mix of Bruce Springsteen and the Rocky soundtrack. His routine usually involves running forwards and backwards, sidestepping, and looking tough. So that's Rambo.
I wasn't feeling especially brave today, but I gave him a sideways glance and a nod of acknowledgment, from one eccentric to another.
Well, my vision is starting to go, which usually means that I haven't had enough to eat. Time for some quinoa!
2 comments:
Today I heard an academic whose dissertation was on the history of the Mission district refer to the current state of things where "once you go north of Valencia, it's all hipsters".
Man, I miss the City, hipsters and all.
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