Another gorgeous, sun swept autumn day and another run around the Reservoir in Central Park, a pastime I can’t imagine ever growing tired of – although my knees do sometimes offer a minority opinion.  Perfect weather and amazing scenery, a combination that makes exercise seem like utter self indulgence.

Arguably the most valuable waterfront real estate on earth the Reservoir has always offered me an immediate remedy to the infrequent, yet inevitable, bouts of metro-malaise. (The feeling of being disguised in a maze – I’m sure I don’t know where I’m going and I’m even more sure I don’t want anyone to notice.)  It is here during my daily runs around the water that I have experienced my only link to any sort of organic rhythm, a place where I could actually see things sprout, bloom and die in a space of time longer than a local stop on the 6 train.  But, as I’ve learned over the years, the Reservoir is more than just a pastoral retreat.   It is also a community unto itself.  In fact it is probably the closest thing, for me, to small town life, a village at the very heart of New York City.

Running the 1.5 mile circuit year after year I’ve become aware of a host of characters that share my daily compulsion.  There’s  Alberto Salazar, for many years the unofficial Mayor of the Reservoir, waving me on with a nod and a smile, a daily presence that is sorely missed.  There are also my fellow runners; the stalwarts that I’ve been slogging alongside, month after month.  Then there are those that come only to observe, to escape the gasp and clatter of the city street.

For instance: every afternoon a smartly dressed woman with tightly drawn black hair walks a tiny beribboned white dog, an invariably color coordinated duo.  A red haired man in plumber’s overalls visits each evening with a tall can of beer in a brown paper bag, a lit cigarette and a smile.  At the south end of the Reservoir there’s a pump house with a terraced area and several benches. There are some men I‘ve seen there for years, stretching, guzzling water, hawking loudly and endlessly adjusting their multi-colored, cross-endorsed accoutrements.  In short doing everything but actually running.  Not that it matters. They’re all part of the community – Reservoir neighbors drawn to the spectacle of a mile and a half of uninterrupted waterfront at the very heart of Manhattan.

I don’t remember the first time I saw her but gradually I became aware of another face traveling regularly in the opposite direction.  She was an attractive young woman and she smiled sometimes, but was otherwise unremarkable and soon became an accepted feature of my daily run.  Then one day as I passed her I noticed something different, and I almost ran myself into a tree as I turned to watch her go by.  She seemed more vital somehow, almost radiant, and I wondered, rather dimly it turned out, if maybe she was wearing more makeup. Time passed and I didn’t see her as often and when I did it seemed that she had gained weight.  She was walking now instead of running and I thought this an unfortunate bit of recidivism.  Then one day as I passed her, it filtered through my endorphin clogged brain that she was, in fact, with child.

After that day I found myself looking forward to seeing her whenever I ran and smiled foolishly when I passed.  Another month or two went by and then when I didn’t see her anymore I began to wonder how things had, well, come out.  A few weeks later I knew as I rounded a curve and saw her coming towards me, beaming and pushing a stroller.

Running around the reservoir, season after season, watching the myriad lights wink on beneath the darkening skyline (New York City dressing for the evening) I’ve come to think of that oval around the water as a metaphor for the calendar.  As I travel up the Fifth Ave. side Cherry blossoms fall silently, carpeting the ground along the eastern shore.  Summer fields lit with firefly’s stretch from the northern edge, with the strands of Aida faintly heard in the background.  On the west side I trudge through piquant drifts of swirling leaves and along the downtown end the trees hang low with ice and snow, the park deserted by the early set of the winter sun, the path darkly lit by a lonely string of sentry street lights.

And just a few weeks ago, as I finished an almost gleeful circuit on a perfect September evening, I saw a young family up ahead at the pump house square.  A mother, a proud father – and a small boy, strangely familiar, all of two years old.  As I neared he slipped from his mother’s grasp, laughing, and started to run towards me.  She quickly retrieved him, and, sweeping him up waved his hand to me as I passed.

I nodded and smiled foolishly all over again.

Then I started back once more around the water, the centripetal tug of the Reservoir, like a great second hand, sweeping me into autumn.