Each day, I jog along a road with gently rolling hills that goes east of our village of Drapanos into the countryside. It is bounded on both sides by fields of grazing sheep and goats. The animals are all fenced in. While I had noticed a few of them out in the road in other places in our area, I had never seen them on this particular road, at least until this morning.
Anyway, I saw them ahead of me as I came puffing along – about 50 very excitable sheep – and as I got closer, they got skittish and began running away from me, further ahead on the road. From this, I learned (first), that sheep can run faster than me, which isn’t surprising, given that there are a few earthworms than can give me a run for my money. Running with the sheep turned a boring jog into a cool experience, though. They would go a ways until they got far enough ahead of me to be comfortable and then they’d stop to eat a bite until I got close enough for them to be frightened and then they’d take off again. It was kind of fun to watch, I’m sure, but there was no one out there but me and the sheep to enjoy this game of tag shortly after sunrise.
Another thing I learned from running with the sheep is that when they are spooked, in addition to running and bleating, sheep have a tendency to “use the outdoor toilet” as it were, all over the road. Now 50 sheep can lay down a pretty “mean sheen,” if you know what I mean and in the remote chance you don’t, the relevant words are turds. LOTS of turds. So many sheep turds, in fact, that avoiding them meant I was running the most difficult obstacle course I’d ever been on in an effort to keep my shoes from getting soiled or, worse yet, to slip on it and fall in the muck.
Now I imagine watching me chasing the sheep was amusing, but I’m sure it had to be absolutely comical to see this balding, pudgy, huffing/puffing old guy doing a wildly improvisational dance as he slithered his way down the country lane dodging sheep turds. The affair looked not unlike someone who stepped onto asphalt with his bare feet in the middle of the hottest day of summer and was trying to make it to the shady grass area. Needless to say, I don’t think I’ve concentrated as intensely on anything as I did navigating that “mine field” since I memorized all the metabolic pathways in graduate school.
Anyway, I’m happy to report that my efforts paid off and I didn’t make any missteps on my return home. I don’t know how the sheep felt about all of this, so I am grateful for Silence of the Lambs. (wink, wink)
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