When I was younger, I used to ride, and I can attest to the fact that even the most sluggish horse will quicken the pace once he realizes that you have turned around and are heading back to the stables.
I also used to run, somewhat obsessively, when I was young: often 70 miles a week, alternating 8-mile and 12-mile runs. Perhaps, I, too, picked up the pace when I turned for home.
Training runs are by nature out and back: you start at home, you end at home.
It can create the sensation that time runs in circles.
In comparative religion, that sensation leads to the Myth of the Eternal Return. The god always returns home, to the same place, as the sun reappears every morning. Not that it is always easy: the ancient Egyptians thought that night was a perilous time for the sun and for all creation, which were both threatened by the snake god of chaos (a snake? Call it a dragon).
Early Christians, following Jewish folklore, believed that Jerusalem, the promised land, was built where Eden once stood. Golgotha, the place of the skull, was where the tree with the forbidden fruit once stood. By mounting the cross, Christ undid what Adam did, and He did it on the very spot where the snake played and Adam sinned. The early Christians, following Saint John of Patmos, also believed that at the end of time, the celestial city, the New Jerusalem, would come down from heaven and replace the old Jerusalem, bringing with it a restored Eden.
That’s a great story, and I hope it’s true.
But, if time runs on in an eternal way, it simply runs on for you and me. I am no longer the young man who rode horses and ran marathons. I no longer choose to quicken the pace, but I can assure you the pace does quicken as we head towards home. It is as it should be. Just stay one step ahead of the snake god.
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