Trotting like a turkey

Until last week, I assumed a ‘Turkey Trot’ must feature a turkey. I imagined participants probably carried one or possibly ate some. But it seems I was being too literal, thinking the clue was in the name, like cheese-rolling or egg-and-spoon races. Turkeys don’t necessarily feature in a ‘Turkey Trot’.

For the uninitiated, a ‘Turkey Trot’ is a type of charity run held across the USA on Thanksgiving morning, before the dinner table is piled high with collard greens, marshallowed sweet potatoes and mac ‘n’ cheese. A way of burning some calories, raising some money and high-fiving some friends before the Macy’s Parade and big sports games begin.

‘Trot’ suggested to me a gentle run but this also is a bit of a misnomer. A trot may be a horse’s slowest speed bar a walk- something akin to the ‘jambles’ my father in law enjoys, slower than a jog, faster than an amble. But serious turkey trotters don’t trot- they wear Lycra and time themselves.

Apparently, the ‘Turkey Trot’ is also a dance. It emerged at the start of the twentieth century, around the same time as the run, named for its jerky moves, like those of a turkey who’s just been given a mirror. The American forerunner of its more elegant sister, the Foxtrot- you just don’t often see anyone attempting it on Strictly.

In the spirit of embracing local tradition, I signed my family up for our neighbourhood TT. I saw the advertisement on the Listserv (for non-Americans, an archaic email-style newsletter that we middle-aged folk use to impart news, one stage on from asking the town crier to yell it around.)

I saw the advertisement a while ago, and by that, I mean a few days (I’m operating with a perimenopausal memory that makes a fruitfly’s memory seem extensive). The problem is I can never work out how to get back into the Listserv to locate a message once I’ve read it. Like its rival delivery service, the carrier pigeon, that message probably ain’t ever coming back.

Waking late, there was no time to harangue my emails for the info but I remembered reading it was a charity event encouraging donations for the local food bank.

Given the last-minute debate with our children about who was attending (only one of them would get up), I was impressed when we drove off with time to spare and a bag of groceries to hand over at the start line.

On arriving, rosy-cheeked runners were swarming the place, lining up to get medals. I know Americans do some things differently to us Brits but it seemed unlikely they would hand out medals to turkey trotters who’d yet to trot.

‘You must have got the time wrong,’ my husband lamented, based on two decades of this sort of mishap.

I was sure I hadn’t so I made my way over to the throng of medalists. I love Gen Zedders- I’ve got 2- but my advice as a member of Gen X is: don’t approach them uninvited and start asking them Turkey Trot questions, whilst swinging a bag of groceries at them. They don’t like it.

The woman I asked looked like she’d stepped out of a Lululemon advert, her perfectly matching headband holding back her perfectly styled ponytail. She swished it at me and turned away.

‘I don’t think these are our people,’ I said, to no one as it turned out- my husband and daughter were now at a safe distance from me. ‘Maybe this is another ‘Turkey Trot’,’ I shouted at them.

It was all very confusing. How many ‘Turkey Trots’ could there be in one car park? But then I spotted a group of runners further away. They looked less Lululmeon, more Listserv.

We approached them but they didn’t look like they were about to set off and no one else had brought their weekly food shop. They all seemed to know one another, unlike the more anonymous younger crowd. I was starting to feel overwhelmed by the complexities of joining in this fowl run.

Then I spotted a man with a large (fake) turkey on his head. For some reason, I assumed he would know how things worked. I am not sure of my logic here- I think I assumed someone with that level of commitment to the cause must have some prior knowledge.

But that didn’t actually follow. My husband had been dressed as a chicken shortly before we set off until he decided it made him look ‘silly’ (I didn’t get the chance to ask how he’d expected to look when he donned an adult bird costume) and he had no prior knowledge of anything Turkey Trot-related.

I explained my situation to the Turkey man and asked him to advise. Was this the run I’d signed up for? My run started at 9am- it was the one where you were meant to bring groceries to enter?

My husband walked off with our dog. I think he thought I should articulate myself differently, or stop articulating myself altogether.

The man looked puzzled. In desperation, I explained I’d forgotten about the need for groceries so I’d only managed to bring tuna and honey- I hoped that was ok.

He looked more baffled.

‘I’m not sure where to leave my pasta- or maybe we are meant to run with it?’

He looked down at me, a serious expression, incongruous beneath the felt bird on his head. There was a long pause.

‘I am not familiar with any of what you’re saying,’ he stated.

He was polite but my British ears, highly attuned to double meanings, wondered if his understatement really communicated: ‘I don’t understand a word you’re saying, get away from me.’ He seemed relieved when I walked off, anyway.

There was no start line, no drop off point for donations. I had a practice at running in a circle with my canvas shopper of food but the tinned tomatoes acted like a pendulum, smacking onto my thighs, then giving me a second of respite, before coming at me again. I decided I’d better leave my bag behind.

Despite the fact I was planning to give the contents away, I worried the wrong people would take them whilst I was running. I’m not sure who I feared. I knew the Gen Z crowd wouldn’t be seen dead with my supermarket tote (it wasn’t even Traders) and the Listserv crowd seemed like an honest bunch. But I hid it under a table anyway.

My husband and daughter were long gone. They clearly had no intention of running in my orbit. I turned round to find a friend- a delightfully kind person who instantly made it all ok. Yes this was the right race, yes it hadn’t started, yes I could run with her. She hadn’t heard about the groceries but she congratulated me on my effort.

We started the run together and I instantly switched concerns. Not having run in a decade, and having never voluntarily done a 5k (maybe unintentionally on a walk-to-school week), I remembered you shouldn’t run after 2 coffees and 3 children.

My aim from them on was to make this a dry run. In my efforts to do this, I ran in a puddle (not my own, thankfully) and spent the rest of the time with my trainer acting like a giant sponge, squelching water with every step.

In fact, the whole pathway was a series of puddles. I wasn’t just doing a 5k, this was an obstacle course. There was a wider pathway, running parallel to us, without any puddles. It looked better than our path and I suggested running on it instead. ‘No, this is our course,’ my friend said. She gave no further information so we stayed on the assigned track.

As I dodged and weaved around the water, attempting some pelvic floors exercises a few years too late, my friend chatted happily next to me. Before long, I forgot about my wet foot, my fatigue and my need for the loo. I actually started to enjoy myself and couldn’t believe it when we saw the finish line.

As we reached the end, people started calling out to me for my barcode. At last, these were my people, I thought- the supermarket lot. Maybe this was a way of registering my groceries.

But that wasn’t what they meant. They wanted my race registration details. It turned out, I’d never registered for the race so they couldn’t count my efforts.

‘Don’t worry- you got the same time as me,’ said my friend excitedly- ‘I’ll send you my race details when I get home.’ We’d done it in 38 minutes- my one and only PB. I noticed my bag of food was now in the sunshine- it had been taken out from beneath the table.

In a world of uncertainty, misinformation and change, I imagine a lot of us experience moments of confusion, like me at the start of the ‘Turkey Trot’. Without the right information to hand and with no obvious route, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the direction and pace of our lives.

It may be there isn’t often time to take stock- we just have to keep running. There may be baggage we want to offload but we don’t know of a safe place so we hide it away from others and maybe even ourselves, or we try to run with it, where it slows us down and periodically bruises us.

What if there was a person we could turn to, like my running buddy- someone full of love and encouragement, who not only sees our issues but also offers to travel by our side? Who keeps us on the right path when other wider, seemingly less problematic ones, offer us a way out?

‘Every minute, every moment
Where I’ve been and where I’m going
Even when I didn’t know it or couldn’t see it
There was Jesus.’

These are the lyrics of ‘There Was Jesus’, a duet sung by Zachary Williams and Dolly Parton. They describe finding Jesus on lonely roads, as a blessing in the broken pieces of life.

There is someone. He’s always with us but we often miss Him. He’s in the burnished leaves skittering along our dog walk to nourish the trees that will blossom in spring; He’s in our local homeless shelters caring for folk in our community in need of a warm meal and a shower; He’s collecting the tears we shed when we receive hard news.

This Thanksgiving, Jack and I were blessed to attend a dinner held for those in our community without a home. The most surprising thing was the amount of faith we encountered there. People with nothing pointed us to Jesus.

A young woman asked at the end of the meal if she could give thanks and broke into a beautiful acapela song of gratitude to her saviour. Two men who’ve repeatedly lost everything when their tents and belongings have been taken say they aren’t bitter, they’re just grateful to Jesus for taking care of them.

They may have very little but they have something a lot of us materially better off maybe don’t have- an unwavering love of their Lord.

One of these men told my husband that Jesus loves to rescue people. He’s repeatedly experienced it. That’s what Jesus was doing when He left heaven to do what we couldn’t do. When we couldn’t find Him, He came to find us, not appearing in opulence and comfort but in a lowly place for cattle. Not too dissimilar to a torn tent under bridge.

Christmas is an invitation to seek Him- to hear Him whisper through the carols, to see Him shine in the candlelight, to feel His love in the festive movies that tell stories of rescue, reconciliation and redemption, all themes borrowed from that very first Christmas story. It’s an invitation Charlie Mackesy explains beautifully in the short podcast at the bottom of this page.

When we got home from the ‘Turkey trot’, I interrogated the Listserv for the original message inviting us to the race. To my horror, I found no one had ever mentioned food donations. It was a free event- there was no requirement other than to show up. For me, personally, this was very bad news. It now means I’ve entered a new stage of old, where I go out in public trying to offload bags of stuff people don’t want and haven’t asked for.

But for the metaphor, it’s the perfect ending. The race is free. You can just show up. You don’t need to register or bring anything. Your presence is enough. Perhaps you’ve been told something different- you think you need to be a certain way- or you heard it wrong, like me with the Listserv, you think you must have certain gifts. But that’s not what Jesus said.

Whatever run you’re on, whatever progress you’ve made, however much baggage you’re carrying, whether you are confused, overwhelmed, lonely, hurt, exhausted or excited, He wants to join you.

We weren’t designed to run solo- He’s done this run before us so He knows that. That’s why He’s already made the first step towards us, and why all that’s left for us to do is take a step towards Him.

“I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.”
‭‭Revelation‬ ‭3‬:‭20