drunk angel in disguise

Having been driven out of the park I've been running in for the past month and a half — a homeless man has taken to following/yelling at me and I'd rather avoid that — I have spent my past two runs exploring other possible routes.

Well, let's go back a little. I drop the whole harassment thing into this post like it's no big deal. I guess for me, someone who has gone on many a run in France, it's really nothing out of the ordinary. French people are not big fans of working out, and especially not girlies who work out (perfect French girl = no muscles and weak/slightly nauseated from too much nicotine). It doesn't even have to be working out like going to a gym in a full spandex outfit. Basically any physical activity outside of the realm of ambling is considered to be de la folie. I've made the 45-minute walk from Aix to my friend's house out in the countryside twice now — it's the countryside. It's gorgeous. Why wouldn't I walk? — and each time her host family was shocked into a near speechless state at the very idea that I would choose to come on foot.

So a girl RUNNING is almost unheard of. In all the time I've spent in France over these past years, I have seen less that 20 women running, I'd say. And the number of men isn't much larger. Someone running is so rare that they automatically stand out and are apparently deemed fair game for any sort of derogatory remark a Frenchy might deem to throw their way. Since I am a girly and have girly parts like legs — forsooth and lackaday! — that show when I wear running shorts, I am equally putting myself at the mercy of those pathetic perverts who think it's just a fab idea to yell things at me. I have also been kicked — I kid you not — and stared at, had mothers pull their children away from me as if I might infect them, chased by prepubescents, and generally not treated very kindly.

So the homeless guy popping out from behind a tree and screaming at me was just any other day, really.

But consequently I had to find other routes, and after two days I have come to the conclusion that Crazy Homeless Chap was really a drunk angel in disguise. Apparently I have spent the past six weeks running on the ugliest possible of routes available to me. I live in an apartment not too far from the centre ville of Aix, but close enough to the countryside that I can reach it on foot. I found myself out in the country, on small winding roads passing gorgeous old houses that could legitimately be called villas. There were cypress trees standing tall against the setting sun, which drenched the entire scene in a pinkish-orange glow. It was so beautiful that I had to shake my head a little to realize that I was actually inside that moment, and not watching a movie set in Provence.

I am still thrown for a loop every time I get yelled at when I'm running. I stomp around furiously, going on and on about how France sucks and every single French person can go choke on a block of Rocquefort cheese and die. Extreme, I know. But then I'll find myself in front of a country house with blue shutters sitting peacefully on a hill, passing by a smiling old couple walking their dogs in the evening light, and I remember why I came to Aix in the first place.