Immediately after my shower. I had run to school (15.3 miles) in August 2011. My husband trailed me & carried my briefcase and lunch. Don’t I look happy? I was.

I loved running. Loved it! I was never very fast, never did better than eight-something miles, never ran a marathon. But I ran the Hood to Coast several times, a bundle of 3ks, the Bridge Crossing, and a slow but official half-marathon in Portland nine years ago (2:17). Ten kilometers was my favorite distance and I aimed for 9-minute miles. I had measured runs of three and four and five and six miles on the beach and highway from my home. I ran at least every other day for years. I used to run the six miles on the beach to my mother’s house in Cannon Beach two or three times a week in summer.

And then I couldn’t do it anymore. I could barely walk for a year. I tried other exercise but biking is unsafe around here and involves a mechanical device, and the pool has too much chlorine. All I have is walking, and I am usually on the sand for over an hour a day without a problem. But I miss running.

That might change. I have decided I might try running again this next year, but to do that I need to weigh less. Wait for weight. When I quit teaching, I was about five pounds over my running weight. I meant to lose eight to fifteen pounds—is this starting to sound familiar?—but instead I have gained fifteen. Now you see it, don’t you?

Weight isn’t a huge issue for me. Well, that’s a lie. I grew up in the twentieth and live in the twenty-first century. I am female. Yeah, weight has been a huge deal all my life. In my teens the doctor was worried when I weighed 121 pounds. My mother tried to put me on a diet. Eventually I lost 7 pounds only because I had my tonsils out when I was fifteen, Ballard Hospital was remodeling, and I was in from Sunday until Friday. They brought me one meal on Tuesday, which I was still too sore to eat and neither the nurses nor I noticed that I was being starved. So I weighed 114 pounds by that Friday and throughout high school. By my senior year of college I weighed 118. Or maybe by then I weighed 121 again. I do not remember.

In my thirties, a friend called me plump when I weighed 130 after my second child. I dieted back to 114, but that did not last.

I began running, a few blocks in April and six miles by August. I am not built like a runner and had absolutely no history as an athlete. But running turned out to be wonderful. I felt strong and capable. I found runner’s high at three and a half miles in a rainstorm and laughed. Thus in my forties, I usually weighed 132 to 142 because of running muscle, lightest by the end of cross country season. (I tried dieting while running but that was pointless.)

During my fifties when I was caring for my mother and running time grew sparse, my weight pushed up. Then grief over my mother’s death took off 40 pounds. People complimented me on my weight loss, which I found ironic.

Like most people, weigh has gone on and then off and then on again with no deliberate effort on my part. I am always impressed by people who maintain a consistent weight throughout their lives. I am not fully in tune with my body. I know it does not want to weigh 114 pounds any more than it liked running more than eight 9-minute miles in a row. Lower weight and longer distance runs were each a struggle. I could do those distance runs, but it was against my body’s better judgement. In 2011 when I ran over 15 miles in bad shoes my body was not happy. My feet up and resigned their commission. I stopped running.

How’s it been without running? Like how a dog with no nose smells. Awful.

So, a new and more reasonable plan. Take a year to go back to my most typical running weight of between 132 and 142, mostly by eating only between 8am and 6pm. Three meals, no snacks, less sugar, more veggies. (Well, we all know that: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly vegetables.”) And walking. For the duration, only walking. At sixty-seven years old, I can not afford to put too much weight on knees and feet. But I think, perhaps, if I can drop those recently gained pounds, I might manage three miles again. Slower miles perhaps and only on sand.

I’ll let you know.