Writing this sat in a state of healthy nervousness, on a small and athletically packed plane, heading to a mildly exotic location in order to participate in, and hopefully complete, another half marathon. Just one more…
My relatively recent flirtation with running has been a bit of a paradox. Quite simply, I’m not remotely built for it and never have been. One thing that had been consistent, all the way from school sports days through to any form of adult sporting participation in my lifetime, was that the running bit had always been the bit I hated and usually did my best to successfully avoid. So the paradox of my current love for running is complex, perhaps tempered by the fact I’m ageing far too quickly for my own liking. It was a combination of factors some 7 years ago that made me test the running water (if you see what I mean) and astonishingly, for myself as well as pretty much everyone that knows me, I took to it like a flabby duck takes to a stagnant pond.
Trying to piece together the “why” is probably a waste of time now as it should all be about the “how”, as in how it makes me feel. Yet it’s good to reflect on the why. There were certainly lots of conflicting questions swirling around my confused brain around that time. Had I made the right life decisions? Was it too late to change any of the major ones? Was I ready for the inevitable decline into mid middle age? And how far from my grasp was the mirage of contentment that is meant to accompany this stage of life? Questions I was grappling with pretty unsuccessfully. Layered on top were work and health issues. A big job but one I was no longer enjoying due wholely to a not so mildly psychotic boss. Was I bold enough to do something about it? A close friend and colleague being crippled by MND. My own health woes and the need for a rebuilt ankle as well as various other scares. Some real “what’s it all about” brain grapplers, that were all thrown into a melting pot, given a catalytic stir on a particularly stormy night, and came together tumultuously in what seemed like an epiphany. Maybe it was. The only output that lasted from this epiphany though was the desire to run. To test myself and lose myself in equal measure. Prove the doctors wrong. Prove my boss wrong. Prove I could do it on my own. Raise money for my friend. Make him proud of me. Shock myself. Show I could achieve more than I dreamt of and that I am not yet ready for my life to start heading downhill. So I did. Marathon first, followed by two more and a heap of half marathons over the last few years.
The “how I feel” is much easier to explain than the “why did I feel the need to do it”. The things I really love about the big run events starts as early as the day before. Travelling to the location you are surrounded by the random hotchpotch of humanity that you know without speaking to them, are heading to the same location to do the same thing. The athlete check in is a people watchers dream, the serious and the not so serious, the old and the young, the groups and the singles, all bustling through the hawkers sausage machine of vim and vitality. Free sunscreen. Healthy drink. Miracle socks. Perhaps a few too many of the not so serious lingering for too long at the local gin stand. Tight t shirts and vests for those that aren’t shaped like me.
The day itself dawns and there’s a rush on in the hotel for the light healthy breakfast plus vats of coffee to boost the caffeine levels. Early in the morning vast arrays of vest clad idiots shuffling along and limbering up towards the start line. Toilet queues everywhere you look. The joy of the “off” and taking in the variety of all that humanity around you. Then trying to find the zone to enable you to just plod on. Same pace, all the way. And finally the full on exuberance and achievement of running through the finish line. Always with a cheeky little sprint to finish. Followed by the celebration if you are up to it. Hearty meal, decent wine, aching limbs hoisted high and a very sound sleep. I know the pattern, and 7 years on I still love it.
In reality though I know that despite the huge enjoyment, I am pushing the broken part of my body way past where it is signalling to me I need to stop. My “rebuilt” ankle. With the obliterated ligaments. That aches all the time even when I’m not running. The warnings are now beyond advice , they are stark and blunt certainties portrayed as fact. From the doctors “do not run again ever” to the physio’s “we may be able to keep it moving for 5 or maybe 10 years before you will need a full replacement”, through to my faithful others “you’ll drop down dead”, all are broadly saying the same thing. So this is the last one. Probably.
Run over, and indeed a few weeks on, running over. The day went pretty much to the script, albeit much slower and more painfully. Staggering towards an alarmed looking ambulance woman 3km from the end, who was sat quietly on her chair minding her own business seemingly trying to just watch the world go by, was a first for me. My leg was spasming badly, and her advice of “ well, you’re nearly there now love” brought me back to focus on the finish. I hobbled down the straight, veering towards the crowd in pain clutching at the barrier at one point, to lots of gasps and oohs, and then there was even an audible cheer as I crossed the finish line. Whilst it was heart warming and well meaning, frankly it was as embarrassing as hell to be that person. I think I knew my fate then.
Since then I have aged 20 years. Unable to walk far or fast, in pain all day every day. Flights are like entering the gladiators pit. And the world seems bereft for me. Bereft of fun, of challenge, of space. Find another hobby I’m told. But right now, as I sit in a park and watch runners pass by on a chill, sunny Sunday morning, I know that I’ve lost a true late life love, and it hurts.
strangefishbigpond 