Today was time for the annual Antelope Run, named after the animal the Arapaho called nisice. They admired the nisice greatly for its ability to run so fast, and cut through the wind like the sharpest knife made from obsidian. Appropriate to the occasion, I saw a group of 18 or so antelope while I was running. It's rare to see that many antelope at one time up top; lower down much larger herds are far from uncommon.
According to my dictionary, there is no direct translation for nisice, and the best approximation would be “faster than Tom Petty”. I think they must have meant Richard Petty and not Tom, but the idea gets across anyway.
Sometimes a fur trapper would show up at an Arapaho village, and sometimes the subject of nisice would come up. Once there was a trapper who showed up and talked like a fool, opining “if only people could eat grass like the nisice, we too could run like the wind.” The Arapaho said nothing in response. There was little to say. Especially when they all knew they were thinking the same thing: “Why do we need to run like the nisice when we have horses? And even if humans could eat grass, who but a fool would believe that we could then run as fast as the nisice? And if humans ate the grass, then what would the buffalo eat?”
Back then, the differences between an enterprising fur trapper, a fool, and being shot through with arrows were often very small.
The fur trappers are now all gone, the buffalo are mostly gone, but there are still some Arapaho. And, in Wyoming, for the present at least, grass and antelope remain almost ubiquitous.
It was a "run straight" day. In case anyone wonders if I have developed the ability to run across water (route to #4), I have not. Consider the possibility of a pond still frozen, or, an unfrozen pond but one which is much shrunken. The mud flat I ran across was actually not bad at all.
All in all, a low key affair. No epunching (let alone touch-free punching, a modern day wonder I have yet to experience), no downloading, no pin punching, no controls, not even any streamers. No water. No spectators or even any other runners!