Before the Deluge

Odd how at times a song lifts you over hurdles. I was running yesterday, with the mini iPod shuffling songs. I'm just now back into marathon training, the longer runs are still difficult, so at mile 8 I was running out of gas and thinking this is for the birds. Then Jackson Browne's "Before the Deluge" started playing. I'm not religious, but some gospel music is special. Its beat and message are uplifting, often without any overt persuasion in its spirituality. It can change the moment. "Before the Deluge" has that beat and message, and as the song played my fatigue became less noticeable and the hills were less difficult. Then the song's refrain:

Let the music keep our spirits high,
Let the buildings keep our children dry.
Let creation reveal its secrets by and by
When the light that's lost within us reaches the sky.

Those are beautiful lines, ones I wish I had written, and hearing them at that particular moment yesterday while running on a remarkably early autumn-like summer day in St. Louis, at a moment when I was ready to give up, ready to stop and walk the rest of the way to the gym--well, I was back into a runner's high, not running fast by any means, but still running and having fun.

Here's a similar kind of commentary by Jimmy Guterman.