I picked it up, used the hem of my runningskirt and wiped the dust off on both side of it, ribbed open the running gel package and consumed it and put the empty package in my pocket. After few minutes and few feet later, I realized that the closest bathroom would be less than 4 miles from where I was. I started to reason with my imagination fear that I could hold it for four miles just in case the running gel didn’t get along with my belly.
Why did I pick the package of the running gel and eat it? I have no idea why I did it but I just couldn’t let it sit and get wasted in the middle of the bike trial. If it were a penny or a 20 dollars bill, I would stop and pick it up. It’s the finder keeper thing. How finding a running gel package in the middle of nowhere would be any different? If I lost something like $10 or $20 bills or my car key, I would be backtracking and looking for it. I have backtracking few runs with several running friends, and I won’t mention their names, when one of us lost our keys. But if any one of us lost a package of a running gel on my long run, I would never backtrack my route to find it, I would keep on running and finishing the run. I don’t think who ever dropped the gel would be backtracking for it.
A mile later, an old memory came and danced in my head.
My mind started bringing me back to a girl who sat next to me in my in class in Vietnam; I think we were in 3rd or 4th grade. I had a small bag of m&m that I brought to school, I don’t know if I had shared it with her or not, but a bag of m&m was a luxury item in VN back then. I finished the bag and rolled it in a ball and tossed it back in my desk’s drawer. When the bell rang, we all got up to leave but I came back because I forgot something. When I came back to the class room I saw that girl went through my desk, picked up the m&m wrap, sniffed it and tried to see if there was anything left in the bag, and there was one melted m&m left and she bended her head back and shook the crumple bag into her mouth. She saw me watching her and gave me a somewhat an embarrassed silly smile and I smiled back. After that I don’t remember anything but I remember we started sharing our foods together for the rest of the school year. The following school year I never saw her again. One in great while when I found myself not finishing a cookie or throwing food down the sink or in the trash, I thought of that girl who sniffed the empty bag of m&m.
Two miles later after the consumption of running gel, I was still feeling pretty good, so far no weird thing happened to my indigestion but I just cannot shake the old memory out of my mind about a young classmate from my childhood who sniffed the empty m&m bag.
