Twice in a week and a half!

Last night it was a warm night (warm being above freezing), and after a frustrating day at work I was looking forward to a nice, tough run. I came home, put on my running tights, my surfing shirt (one of those long-sleeved shirts for water sports to protect you from the sun - my mom thought it was a running top, God bless her little heart), and a sweatshirt and ran out to the track. I ran 16 quarters alternating an 8 minute mile and 10 minute mile pace. That done, I was feeling good, so I decided to do an extra 2 mile loop through streets I knew to be well lit.

So there I am, running, minding my own business. I'm running on Church street which is lined with houses with no fences in their front yards and, well, churches. It's not the kind of street that rapists, or murderers, or kidnappers, or muggers, or embezzlers, or double parkers or other such criminals and unsavory personages tend to hang out on. Up ahead of me I saw a woman in a big, puffy periwinkle jacket walking a little, floppy, curly dog. I was gaining on her fast, and when I was within a couple of yards of her I said, "Excuse me" and ran around her. Only her little puffy dog was off to one side of the sidewalk and she was walking on the other extreme of the pavement, and even though I went up on the grass I passed pretty close to her shoulder.

And she screamed. I don't mean she yelped, I mean she shrieked with a lot of lung behind it. It wasn't the scream that you hear when the murderer jumps out from a dark corner, it was the scream after he pulls the chainsaw out from behind his back.

"Sorry!" I said over my shoulder, in earnest. Her mop started barking mean barks at me. I'm afraid of dogs and this little thing wasn't even making me nervous, but I ran away anyway. I thought of stopping and saying something to her. I thought of sticking around to reassure the neighbors who were sure to come out their front doors any second. But the damn dog was barking at me, and what do you even say in a situation like that? So I kept running.

The thought of me frightening someone is totally ludicrous. I'm shorter than 5'2", I'm universally classified as "cute" by people who know me, I'm most often likened to Ellen Degeneres (and not just because I'm gay), I was running about 6.5 miles per hour in stretch pants. You would think that I couldn't strike fear into a six-year-old, but this is the second time in a week and a half that I've made a grown woman scream. Am I missing something?