How a Bus Ride Changed Everything

When I look back at that moment, it still makes me smile. I was on a public bus—a college freshman just arrived in Georgia from Dhaka, Bangladesh.

We were winding through suburban Atlanta, and I saw someone running. I distinctly remember craning my neck to see who was chasing him.

“Hmm, people here run even when they don’t have to,” I thought.

The memory says a lot more about me than it does about the universal culture of running. All my life, sports—of any kind—didn’t interest me. I wasn’t good at them; I didn’t follow them. I never exercised a day in my life.

That wasn’t a problem in my 20s and early 30s. (Hello, metabolism!) But when, in my 40s, I ballooned to well past the ideal weight for a 5'8 frame, I knew I needed to do something about it. I came across a Couch to 5K app and figured I could, at the very least, run for one minute.

I took to the road and two things happened: I felt a kind of exhilaration I’d never felt before, and the pounds started melting away. I was hooked. I signed up for a 5K, then a 10K, then a half, then a full.