Running with Mosquitoes

  Last weekend I went out of town, and while I was gone it rained. It is summer, and I do live in the South, so mosquitoes rapidly propagated themselves. Being out of town, I did not run during the weekend. Well, I actually had not run since I had my wisdom teeth removed, simply because I am lazy. But Monday is always the day to start over. So on Monday afternoon I laced up my running shoes and stepped outside into ninety degrees fahrenheit and one hundred percent humidity.

  When I started, I intended to run three miles. It only takes about half an hour to run that distance, and so it seemed very possible in accomplish my goal. The first mile was hot, the second uncomfortably so. Nothing suck the will-power and the strength out of you like the burning sun. On most days I probably would have tried to barrel on through the third mile, but on Monday I encountered the mosquitoes I had not seen all summer. At first I hoped to outrun them, but the little fiends were starved for blood and they tried to bury their proboscises into every inch of my skin that was exposed to the air. After I finished the second mile, I had enough of running with monsters. I walked about a quarter of a mile, trying to brush mosquitoes away from my arms and shoulders. Then I turned around and realized I had a swarm of the creatures following my person. I completely forgot the concept of cooling down after a run and made a mad dash for the house.

  I was able to evade the mosquitoes and so I went inside to tell my Mom about my run. She pointed out to me that I probably would have been fine had I used mosquito repellant. So on Tuesday I did, and I did not get bit by mosquitos. I did, however, run through a few swarms of gnats, and I am still surprised I did not inhale any. Hopefully I will run again this week, and I will wear mosquito repellant again.