Inspiration (?) at Lake Willoughby

Maybe because Day 259 in my quest to run every day for a year was kind of a boring number, my endorphin-high, oxygen-starved brain latched onto a road sign last Thursday as I crested a hill above Lake Willoughby, a few miles into the best run of my weeklong family lake vacation. Brownington.
A town in Vermont that I had never heard of, despite living here for most of my 44 years. I was running in Brownington, Vermont. And it was really beautiful. And there are 251 towns in Vermont, right?

So I dragged my son out to take this weird posed photo of me in front of this sign (which marks the line between the town of Westmore and the town of Brownington; Lake Willoughby in the background), and my next running quest began.

I love to run, but I also seem to need gimmicks, or lists, or peaks to bag in my running journey to keep me going. Training plans ripped from magazines, far-flung marathons to travel to, PRs listed in the back of my running log, membership in the U.S. Running Streak Association ... The running every day thing has been great for me since I started on 11/11/11. It has kept me going as I started adding college courses into my schedule this past year, fulfilling my prerequisites for the MSN (nurse practitioner) program I'm starting next month at UVM, and getting busier and busier. It erased all my excuses for not getting out the door: a late night studying Anatomy & Physiology was no reason not to set the alarm for 5:30 to squeeze in my run. I'm always happy once I get out the door. But, yeah, at Day 259 or so, I needed something else. And something that would keep me somewhat close to home in the next few years as I start this intensive grad school program.

It felt like I had run in half of Vermont in the last week: Chittenden County as usual, Saxtons River where I was spectating at the State Babe Ruth tournament, all around Lake Willoughby. So I found a list of Vermont towns and checked off just those I could definitely remember running in (not counting high school track... or field hockey). And my list totaled a wimpy 37 towns! I've got a long way to go.
I look forward to seeing many more beautiful places in my home state, and running at least a mile in each. I'm blogging in the hopes that some friends will join me on some of these runs and help me stick a few pins in my map, and also that maybe I'll hear from some Vermonters in some of these yet-to-be-run-in-by-me towns, who can tell me about their towns: running routes, swimming holes and refueling possibilities.

My list so far (my big map with pins is not up yet, so hopefully these are all official towns; I still need to do an official count, that 251 number may be too high):
1. Bolton
2. Brownington
3. Burlington
4. Calais
5. Cambridge
6. Charlotte
7. Chelsea
8. Colchester
9. Chester
10. Duxbury
11. East Montpelier
12. Essex
13. Glover
14. Grand Isle
15. Hinesburg
16. Huntington
17. Jericho
18. Lyndon
19. Milton
20. Montpelier
21. Quechee
22. Richmond
23. Rockingham
24. Shelburne
25. South Burlington
26. South Hero
27. Stowe
28. Thetford
29. Underhill
30. Warren
31. Washington
32. Waterbury
33. Westford
34. Westmore
35. Williamstown
36. Williston
37. Winooski