Fingers crossed 🤞🤞🤞🤞🤞.
So I put together this training plan; way way back at the start of the year…
I was just about ready to close the book on running, had several conversations with Mol about this very thing. Aches in my left hip, aches in both my knees, aches in my achilles tendons, aching in my shoulders, aching in my back, my neck, even (silly as it sounds) occasional aching in my face. All of this on top of the daily battle that goes on between the griping in my stomach and the need to just get on with life.
I was bored of it. Had enough.
Every single day it seemed that daily fight was getting harder; creeping tiredness, maybe from the lockdown requirement to work shifts, adding further to my woes.
But I’d paid an entry fee already, in fact two; for events postponed because of COVID.
So I put together this training plan.
One to drag my 6kg heavier carcass out of the depths of occasional, sporadic running, without purpose, without goal; with nothing else going on other than keeping my mind healthy at the expense of ageing, creaking joints that were simply being aggravated by the bits of running I was doing.
But I‘d paid an entry fee already…
From humble beginnings of a plan that began December 21st (shortest day - start at least with one thing to feel hopeful for) and had no expectations of any running at all until January was past; I have slowly, steadily, built my mileage block by block - 3 weeks on and 1 week off - until I’ve hit the magic milestone today of 40 miles for the week and 20 miles for my long run.
The weight is starting to fall. By BMI at my height I slide into “overweight“ at the 78kg mark. Still a little bit to go to dip under it, but I know I feel my best when I’m a couple of kilos below that line.
”But you’re pretty slim” they say to me in work when conversation turns to this. I am not. Take away my T-shirt and I’ve jelly round my belly just like everybody else. They see me as slim only because they, and everyone else it seems, are getting fatter and fatter, and fatter.
I remember as a boy reading “Fire and Ice” by Robert Frost.
I’m afraid what we know of climate change has provided the answer to how the world ends - unfortunately, long before we get there, the greed and gluttony of Western civilisation will see us all perish consuming a mountain of crap food delivered to us by Just Eats, and dying from the diseases brought to us by the rats feasting in the litter left by McDonald’s for the uneducated and uncaring to dispose of responsibly on their behalf.
SHIT is the biggest problem we seem to be facing now.
Shit food.
Shit ethics.
Shit councils that no longer deal with the rats.
Shit education system (politics, citizenship, social responsibility and basic life skills anybody?).
Shit people that care nothing for a beauty spot - they must think their pizza boxes and McDonald’s bags improve the landscape for everybody else.
Shit dog owners, that either don’t walk their shit dogs or clean up the shit behind them.
Yes, the more I think about it, the more I see that we are living in a world of shit!
It falls on all of us to try and do something about it.
We can’t rely on our Government for joined up thinking and consideration for the consequences of what they decide we’re all supposed to do:
Case in point; twice weekly home testing kits for COVID…
How much plastic (have you seen those kits?) will end up in our oceans when 60 million of us in the UK are doing that? Let alone the rest of the world!?
Bye bye Albatross, it was nice seeing you before plastic ingestion took your species away completely.
(Don’t need to be scientists to see what killed this bird, do we)
Human life is far from being the only life that matters; and there are more than enough of us to go round.
I don’t see COVID-19 as the disease at all - I see it as the cure!
Overpopulation of humans is killing everything - why are we rushing to ensure we get back to how things were?
How things were has led us to where we are.
And where we are is SHIT!
That’s not what I was going to write about at all, but nevermind, I did, so I guess I must be feeling it’s important.
It was a sign on a little post I saw as I trotted over dry and dusty peat bog:
”Conservation Area, No Public Access”.
It appears as a path on the OS map.
So now I have a choice…
Do I be like all the shit people;
“It’s on the map, it’s my right of way, I don’t care what your silly little sign says”?
Or do I turn round and go back;
Make a little sacrifice today so I can at least hope it will still be there for my children when they reach the age of 48?
There might be grandchildren by then ‘n’all.
Anyone who really knows me, will know which one I chose.
Anyone who would prioritise themselves today above their kids tomorrow - kindly remove yourself from my Facebook “Friends“ list - I don’t want to know people like that anymore.
It was actually a good run - despite the grumbling it has inspired 😊.
Jog up high onto a mountain plateau in the early morning mist and try to find the circular trail I know is there on the OS. 2.5 hours had passed before I saw another soul. They were nice people. We had a brief, but interesting chat.
And just in-case you were wondering, despite my feelings about COVID and lockdown and the horrible taste the neglect of our children to protect our fat and old has left - I have been fully compliant and respectful of other’s wishes every step of the way.
It is my cross to bear that I hate myself for not rebelling against something I have felt all along is grotesquely unfair.