I have written before about my early morning routine of running the streets of our subdivision. That routine includes running each of the nine cul-de-sacs in the development. Adding the cul-de-sacs to my route ensures enough distance to meet my mileage goal. Miss a cul-de-sac, miss the satisfaction of having accomplished my goal.

My service to our presbytery has recently taken a busy turn with significant business before a couple of the committees with which I am involved. The issues are complex and take not only too many Zoom calls, emails, text messages, and telephone conversations, but a lot of thinking time to process new information and formulate next moves. What better thinking time than the morning run?

So intense has been my thinking, though, that I sometimes end my morning run wondering – and certainly not remembering – if I made all the turns onto cul-de-sacs that my routine requires. Was I so lost in thought that I simply kept running instead of making that left or right turn onto Ursa Cove or left turn onto Bruin Pass? Okay, the time I was out running indicates the mileage was accomplished. I guess autopilot worked.

In fact, if I miss a cul-de-sac or two on my morning runs little damage is done other than to my adherence to a dull routine. But my (over) thinking the issues that preoccupy me can also mean that I miss more than a jog down a cul-de-sac. Am I so distracted by my mind’s meandering that I forget to turn down the cul-de-sacs of the responsibilities and joys I have as husband, father, grandfather, friend, and neighbor? Will I come to the end of my course having neglected the important for the immediate?

Some of the cul-de-sacs in our subdivision are only a few houses long. Others are home to many houses. So it is with the cul-de-sacs of my life. Some are occasional and brief, others are daily and significant and the source of much good. If my life is to be filled with all that God intends, I must not neglect to run the cul-de-sacs.