Ugly in there...

JosephTree

Barefooters
Sep 7, 2010
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Near Valley Forge, PA
I wasn't sure where (or if) to post this, but it was sticking around in my head...here you go:

A few days ago I was finished with my run, my first time around a nice little lake , just over a 5 miles on a beautiful trail. I was feeling good, the sun was shining and my bare feet had gotten me all around the lake without any nasty surprises. About 100 yards away from me, on the shore of the lake were a couple guys fishing and I thought I'd go see how they were doing as I cooled off. Between me and them was a lady kind of ambling along the shore in the direction of the fishermen. There was also a fly fisherman across a little inlet to our left. By the time I picked my way down there, being very careful getting my feet through the wide band of hard, dried Goldenrod stubble, the 2 fishermen had moved around a bend to the right and the lady as well. As I came enough around the bend to see that they were all still 40 or 50 yards farther away from me, I stopped and sort of stood there trying to decide whether or not to carry on trying to see them. At that point the lady looked at me and in a loud enough voice to carry that far and probably a good deal farther, called out "oh, you were following me, huh? ...and now you see I'm not here all alone!" and on a bit in that nasty, insinuating vein. I just looked at her and gave a shoulder shrug. What I thought was "So that's your first thought when you see a guy in bare feet walking in your general direction? It must be a real treat living in your head!"
 
What I thought was "So that's your first thought when you see a guy in bare feet walking in your general direction? It must be a real treat living in your head!"

Well, she probably wasn't so much aware that you were barefoot, but she was very much aware that there was a bloke behind her moving in the same general direction as she was - she wouldn't know that it was the fish you were interested in, would she? For a lot of women (myself included) this kind of situation triggers all kinds of alarm bells in the head. To experience fear (be it for real or imaginary reasons) is always a treat!
 
It is always difficult when people assume the worst about our intentions. I have had it done to me, although not in this kind of situation. Sometimes there is good reason for their fear, sometimes things are just out of the comfort zone.
 
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The fact that you were unsure to post this is a clear indicator that your were the victim of some sort of bullying. It's a classic symptom.
This sort of thing plays on your mind because it was designed to, she wanted you gone and to make you feel uncomfortable in your own space.

Empathy is a good thing. If she was acting vulnerable and looking afraid you would have normally clocked it and taken the appropriate steps to make her feel at ease and safe.
Most people do this many times a day without even realising it, body language is a powerful thing. Sometimes we miss the clues or maybe get distracted (in your case it could have been the fishermen) but no one is perfect and certainly no one deserves to be verbally abused for it, that's not justifiable behaviour.
 
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OK, picture me 50 yards away from this lady, 2 fishermen between us on the shore and 50 yards away behind me, in clear line of sight, is the fly fisherman. I'm standing with my hands at my sides, barefoot and shirtless in lycra shorts - looking pretty flimsy overall after my run. I couldn't tell clearly, but my guess would put her age somewhere within 10 years of my 57. Bright sunshine and unobstructed views for most of a mile in most directions. It just didn't look like a threatening scenario to me which is why her assuming that I had nefarious intentions took me considerably by surprise.

My guess now is that she was carrying considerable baggage - it just didn't show.
 
I try to make my presence known and avoid the possibility of surprising someone.
I don't want to take the chance of making someone feel threatened.
After all, who is going to tell my side of the story, if I take two slugs in the chest?
http://www.propublica.org/article/five-stand-your-ground-cases-you-should-know-about

"Woman shoots and kills barefoot runner, mistaking sweaty shirtless man for a deranged stalker at the lake."
 
Quite a few years ago - before I became a barefoot runner - I came home early from work and took my dog for a run - a really bad day at work and needed to destress. I was running (and still do) run along an old railway trail. As I was running I could see a young woman in the distance bobbing along with headphones on and obviously into her music. The trail bent to the right and she got out of my sight. As I came around the corner - a guy jumped out of the trees behind the young woman - wearing a pair of sneakers - and was obviously very interested in her! He then heard the jangle of the dog chain and turned around, saw me and my 90 pound German Shepherd - Sam - bearing down on him - and jumped back into the trees. The young lady in front was oblivious to what had happened behind her. I ran up to her and tapped her on the shoulder and told her what had happened and asked her to please pay attention to what was going on around her. She took off - off the trail and onto the public road. I ran onto a friends house to report what I saw but when the cops eventually arrived - the guy had long gone. I later found out through other friends that she told everyone a story of a weird guy running with a dog who had tried something on with her by telling her that someone had jumped out of the trees behind her! However - folks who lived along the trail knew me and my wife very well - and had trained their dogs with us - and informed that young lady that she was lucky I was there to scare the guy off. I shudder to think what might have happened had I not had a serious disagreement with someone at work and was not in the trail at that particular time!! I have never seen her since and luckily have seen nothing else like it since then.
 
It seems like people spend a lot of time in a word of their own when walking around.
I couldn't walk around with headphones in my ears, I would feel too detached from the world.
I like to be alert when I'm out and about, probably from being chased and attacked back in my punk teenage years.
I can sense danger quite well these days and am kind of irritated by all the people walking around with their heads down playing with their stupid phones and not looking where they are going.
If they had done this back in my home town they wouldn't have lasted very long.
Running barefoot is like driving an electric car, silent. Maybe we need to have a recording of regular running with shoes on and play it back through loudspeakers as we are running so we don't scare people.

Neil
 
Although this is related to the dangers women face in ours society, anyone with half a brain can see it's tough out there and would have empathy with it, this is also about taking responsible for your actions. You cannot go about verbally attacking someone without due cause, there are actually laws against it for a reason.
Playing the vulnerable woman card is not an excuse for bad judgement, self-centred, anti-social behaviour.
Joseph was the one put in danger, both physically and emotionally by the action of this women, not the other way round, but sadly these issues often get overlooked, or watered down in favour of the big headlines.
 
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...Running barefoot is like driving an electric car, silent. Maybe we need to have a recording of regular running with shoes on and play it back through loudspeakers as we are running so we don't scare people.
Neil


Think BELLS!

Old joke:
Why do they put bells on cows?
.
.
.
...Because their horns don't work.
This used to be one of my kids' favourites.
 
I wasn't sure where (or if) to post this, but it was sticking around in my head...here you go:

A few days ago I was finished with my run, my first time around a nice little lake , just over a 5 miles on a beautiful trail. I was feeling good, the sun was shining and my bare feet had gotten me all around the lake without any nasty surprises. About 100 yards away from me, on the shore of the lake were a couple guys fishing and I thought I'd go see how they were doing as I cooled off. Between me and them was a lady kind of ambling along the shore in the direction of the fishermen. There was also a fly fisherman across a little inlet to our left. By the time I picked my way down there, being very careful getting my feet through the wide band of hard, dried Goldenrod stubble, the 2 fishermen had moved around a bend to the right and the lady as well. As I came enough around the bend to see that they were all still 40 or 50 yards farther away from me, I stopped and sort of stood there trying to decide whether or not to carry on trying to see them. At that point the lady looked at me and in a loud enough voice to carry that far and probably a good deal farther, called out "oh, you were following me, huh? ...and now you see I'm not here all alone!" and on a bit in that nasty, insinuating vein. I just looked at her and gave a shoulder shrug. What I thought was "So that's your first thought when you see a guy in bare feet walking in your general direction? It must be a real treat living in your head!"

stupid people exist everywhere, ignore them, a strong emotional person doesnt care for peoples opinions i think
 
Curiosity killed the cat! Lol! Having no idea what was going on in her head, take it with a grain of salt and move on. She could have waited til you were in pistol range...
 
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I've been running a rural 10-13 mile course for about 10 years now and know most of the regular walker/runners/ dog walkers that I come across but occasionally, they'll be someone I don't recognize and if it's a woman, and she looks worried because a shirtless, barefoot guy is running towards her, I'll move out to the middle of the road or the other side to help assure her I mean no harm. When we pass, I'll wave or say Hi. I haven't been maced or tasered so it must work!