Is Friday Really The End?

 

 Dec. 18, 2012

Well, if the Mayans have it right, there are only four days of running left.

I noticed one of the local radio stations was running a last-day on Earth promotion. Gosh, I hope this isn't the case. I'm scheduled to work Friday through Monday. In addition to not being around, it just won't seem right not going out for a run.

Just in case, I thought I'd do some Googling just to make sure the world wasn't really coming to an end. And second, to see if Will Smith had any ideas on how to save the planet, and where I needed to be to get on the spaceship.

A Reuters article by Gabriel Stargardter says this is the end of  "an age in a 5,125 year-old Maya calendar, an event that is variously interpreted as the end of days, the start of a new era or just a good excuse for a party."

Myself, I'm hoping this is the Cinco de Mayo of world-enders, and we all have a good drink and a laugh come Friday.

"No one knows what it will look like on the other side," Michael DiMartino told Stargardter. The 46-year-old American is organizing one of the biggest December 21 celebrations at the Maya temple site of Chichen Itza on the Yucatan peninsula, according to the story.

According to the Reuters piece, when dawn breaks on Friday, the Maya Long Count calendar says it marks the end of the 13th bak'tun -- an epoch lasting some 400 years -- and the beginning of the 14th.

So who's to blame for all the end-of-the-world hysteria?

Stargrdter goes on to write that information more than likely would  have languished in academic obscurity had Michael Coe, a Maya expert, not written in the 1960s that to the ancient Mesoamerican culture the date could herald an "Armageddon" to cleanse humanity.

Bingo! The cult of 2012 had a life. And now a website thanks to the Mexican Tourism Agency is counting down to the big day. "Mundo Maya 2012" is your one-stop shop for all things end of time.

So what does any of this have to do with running, jogging or working out? Well, I guess in the grander scheme of things it means there won't be any log entries in a lot of running diaries on Friday. 

Closer to home, I'll probably be slogging through snow for the first time this fall-winter season, which is kind of the end of the world for some runners.

Mostly, it seemed a heck of a lot more interesting than telling you that yesterday was my longest run since my cough and cold set in. While it wasn't a wonderful piece of athleticism, it was successful in terms of getting out and getting the old body in motion.

So enjoy the Earth while it lasts and get out there and move. And if we're all still here on Friday, lift a glass in celebration. If not, well good luck on the other side.