romance.

I'm a bit of a romantic. Sometimes I seek romance in really silly ways. I boil water in a teapot, even though I could save a lot of time in the morning by just using the microwave. Microwaves are not romantic. I don't have a coffee pot, but if I did, it would be a french press. I sing while I do my dishes. These are all small things, but they help in the end.

And yet, there are always the things that seem romantic but are actually romantic fallacies. Running in the rain is one of these. Maybe it's the movies - we always see lovers running in downpours, trying to catch the one that got away, to finally grab them and kiss passionately. Even if they're running to catch a bus and they miss it, it's still that much more romantic because it's raining. But running in the rain for the sake of exercise, starting at one point and making a circle, plodding along with no real change of pace...well, it's not romantic. It's wet. It makes your eyelashes start to stick together. It turns any bare skin into a weird shade of red. If it doesn't make you cold, it makes you feel like your own personal jungle. All this from a mere drizzle.

There is hope though. On one typical spring afternoon about a year ago, one with typically unpredictable weather, the sun came out and I saw my window to go for a run. Of course, the rain started again at my furthest point from home. I begrudgingly kept going, did I really have a choice? As I neared my apartment feeling moist and annoyed, the sun came, full and bright. Immediately I looked for the rainbow, and there it was - a full arch over downtown St. Paul. And I ran straight for it with a huge smile on my face, looking like a big goon. It took me a few seconds to realize that "Walking on Sunshine" was playing on my ipod, which made it all the more perfect.

So what if it wasn't raining then? That is romance.