I checked in to my Airbnb in Midtown, Detroit, on Tuesday night. I was working my company’s booth at KubeCon, a big tech conference. After unpacking my bags, I laced up my shoes, put on my headlamp, and went for a run in the dark of the evening.
A lot had changed since I was last in this area. I used to work here occasinally, at the DMC and Harper hospitals on Woodward Ave. It had been probably 7 or 8 years since I was last in Midtown. It was very likely that the last time I was here, I was running in the area with friends. I noticed a lot of visible changes in the area. There were a lot more storefronts, and new apartment buildings, and a lot more young people. It was uncharacteristically warm for a late-October night, and many bars and restaurants has bustling patios filled with young people. Midtown has evolved in the past decade to be at odds with Detroit’s reputation as the epitomy of urban decay in America. There are still sites with abandoned buildings, empty lots, and rusted-out car bodies, but I’d say that these are uncommon exceptions rather than the commonplace norm of decades ago.
At sunrise, I went out for a run on the Dequindre Cut. The Cut had been partially finished when I lived here a decade ago. Now, it is extended to nearly twice the length, stretching nearly 2 miles all the way from the waterfront to Mack Ave. I felt like I was running through an urban oasis as I shuffled along the straight, flat path below city street level. It’s an awesome gem in the city for runners, walkers, and cyclists. Local art displays alternate with brick ruins of loading docks. It’s surprisingly green, with grass fields between the paved path and the concrete and brick remains, and planted banks connecting up to the surrounding city streets. The Dequindre Cut is a really beautiful experience, and it’s so unique to Detroit. It made me really happy to see it expanded so much over the past decade. It also made me so happy to see how popular it was; I ended up running on the Cut 4 times over my 5 night stay, and I saw other runners, cyclists, and walkers on the Cut every time I was out there.
I loaded up my run-commuting backpack on Thursday night and ran from the convention center to Atwater Brewery to meet the Atwater run club. Back in 2014-2015, I ran many of the first club runs. This was before the modern taproom existed. The entrance was the modern-day loading door, and they served beer at a small bar in the back. Patrons had to walk between the fermenters and stacks of pallets, which held kegs and bottled beer. I caught up with my friends Steve and Kris as we ran around Detroit, and I enjoyed catching up with my friend Dave over dinner and a beer after the run. I saw a few other friendly faces that I hadn’t seen in years. Around 9pm or so, I put my commuting backpack on and ran the Dequindre Cut again to get back to my Airbnb.
Saturday morning, I trotted out the door shortly after sunrise to join a few dozen runners for the RunDetroit store run. I ran with a few of the same friends from Atwater, but also some new faces. The store rotates the routes every weekend, and we opted to run a different route that covered more scenic areas than the prescribed path of the day. Once again, I found myself on the Dequindre Cut, and running by Atwater, and running on the waterfront, and running through downtown. I got my last dose of run-based sightseeing before hopping on my flight home in the afternoon.
This trip back to Detroit brought up the theme that as distance runners, our baseline for relating to a place is often influenced heavily by our running experience. When I think about my years living in Michigan, and working in Detroit, my mind goes first to the paths, the trails, and all the places that I’ve see through running. I rarely find myself recalling the hospitals that I worked at, or the roads that I used to drive on my commute, even though I spent as much time at those places as I did running.
Every run in a place can plant that seed of feeling like you really know a place. The more times you carry yourself through an area on your own two feet, the more that feeling grows. If you were to drop me anywhere along the Huron River in Ann Arbor, MI, and told me to run to Main St, I would know immediately where to go and which trails and paths to take. I would know this, even though I haven’t run along the Huron River in more than 7 years. I only lived in Ann Arbor for 5 years, but it was a rare week if I didn’t do at least one run on the river. That’s the kind of baseline relationship to a place that I’m talking about.
I’ve been fortunate to live in a lot of places as a distance runner. Each visit back to these places provides an opportunity to revisit and reaffirm my relationship to that place. Every run is a chance to observe how the place has evolved, for better or worse. I only visit my parents’ house a couple times per year, but I’m always amazed at the new housing developments that I can see in the distance, or the changes to landscaping in front yards, or new washouts of dirt roads. I visit Colorado once or twice per year, and I love to see the peaks of South Boulder, Green, and Mt. Sanitas. I smile every time I see a photo of the Maroon Bells, or a mention of the town of Silverton. These are all places where I’ve run, and I don’t know them in any other way.
My visit to Detroit was a reconnection. A life of distance running in so many places has created an infinite number of reconnection opportunities in my future.