1. A New Solitude
He is running. He is hearing the sound of his own deep breathing. Those who do not run regularly for such long two to four hours will not be able to imagine how cleverly they have to rhythm the flow of life to the depths of their navels. The fascination with the success of each of these breathing strategies makes the run even longer.
Sometimes it feels good to run into a new solitude. Sometimes he appears on the most secluded bank of the river near the deep forest. The turbulence of the river water above the soft fine silt. Sometimes when he runs like this, two wild dogs run with him from the forest to the river bank. The smell of water wafts through the air there. It’s not that the dogs run the same way with him. They stop occasionally. They smell the earth, try to sniff each dust separately and then follow his motion to find any other smell. That day he stood very close to the water of the river, he felt an amazing satisfaction to see his own footprints on the mud, as well as the footprints of those wild dogs. When he returned, the dogs would return with him.
He usually doesn't even know when the dogs get into the forest and disappear while walking along the edge of the forest. Both the coming and going of dogs is very sudden. His home is on the other side of this forest. This forest started from the back of his house. There is, of course, a long road that leads through this forest to the other side where this lonely river flows. Is something inevitable happening between him and the river that makes him run here again and again?
As he ran through the forest today, he felt that the forest wanted to show him something special. This feeling was sometimes so intense that at times he was slowing down. Through those gaps of the branches of the trees, the darkness and the morning sky appear a little different. Overwhelmed by a strange fog.
The dogs are now already very close to the water on the river bank. Their feet are sinking in the waves. It is as if they are trying to see just how far the waves are coming from, or the dogs are just like him today, and have the vision of something floating on the waves. This vision is recurring whenever he closes his eyes for the last few days. However, the discomfort of not seeing the dogs on the road while coming here seemed to increase. Now a relief.
He sits on a high mound of dry soil far behind those dogs standing in their knee deep water in the river as if reaching out for the body still unseen.
Today, not the dogs, rather he seems to have followed the dogs. Any follow-up comes to a commitment in one way or another. He suddenly comes to the fact of his appointment with the doctor today. His friend forced him to make the appointment. If he doesn't keep it, his friend will be angry. The time has come. He comes back.
