Sometimes I forget running is fun. It's my own fault. I race a lot. There are spreadsheets and schedules and next thing you know it's my other job. This morning I was up at six and punching the time clock.

It was one of those days. I just wasn't feeling it. It was too hot. There were too many people out. I was checking off the miles like a prisoner etching hatch marks into a cell wall. I was 15 miles in and heading back toward my car for a Gatorade refill, ten miles to go. My iPod was up too loud like I do when I'm trying to pretend my body is someplace else. I saw her lips move and had to turn it off.

"Sorry?" I said, pulling one of the earbuds out.

"Did you do that race?" She pointed at my shirt, a freebie from a run earlier in the year.

I can't tell how old kids are anymore. Probably she couldn't drive, and I was guessing she was using the big girl potty. That's the best I could do, but however old she was, she wasn't having any trouble keeping up with me.

"I ran it, too. I like to run. Don't you like to run? How far are you running today? I'm running nine miles. My mom runs, too. She's running today. Look! That's my mom. She's doing fourteen miles. Do you do ultras? My mom does ultras. She did Bulldog. What races are you training for? I don't know what race I'm doing next. It depends. There's a lot of homework in the 8th grade. My name's Emily. What's yours?"

I don't know what it was. If anyone else had interrupted my run like that, had talked so darn much, had been so darn persistent, I most certainly would've been miffed. But she was so, so cute. So cute and enthusiastic and so very earnest. I wanted to laugh, but I was afraid it would seem like I was laughing at her. And I wasn't. I wanted to laugh because she was having such a good time, the wind in her long, brown ponytail, her shoes slapping along in the dirt. She was having the time of her life. She felt like I do when I stop racing so much, when I set fire to the damn spreadsheets.

After talking to Emily, I wanted to back over my stopwatch with the car. I didn't do that. But I didn't get the Gatorade refill either. Yes, I've got a race coming up. Yes, I should've logged all the miles. But my heart was done for the day, and this once I let it override my head. I drove home along the Pacific Coast Highway with the radio blaring, watching the surfers bob in the waves and the palm trees blow. It was fun. I had fun.

So thanks, Emily. I needed the reminder. Run safe out there.