Loving the fields of gold

  • Monday, July 30, 2012
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You'll remember me when the west wind moves
Upon the fields of barley
You'll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we walk in the fields of gold
(Sting)

Post thunderstorm run, the atmosphere, trails and spirit washed clean. Running up a grassy hill and greeting the sun, raised palm outward, shouting the words "Bayete Inkosi" (exalted king). Loving the fields of gold.



Annie phones me out of the blue

  • Thursday, July 26, 2012
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Annie phones me out of the blue. This is good as it means I have to pick her up and take her to the club. There is a ripple effect here, I get back to the nitty gritty of pack running with it's hustle and chat. My blog post will not feature touchy feely, esoteric pseudo spiritual stuff. Basic running will produce basic writing. It's 24 degrees Celsius when we arrive and I stand and watch the other runners go through a warm up routine before we get on with good, no frills running. Grunt running. coal face running. The pack swarms through the woods stopping only for some high quality coaching and I find Jerry to listen to while we are taught how to run. Some of us just want to breathe. All the negativity of the last few weeks has no space to be indulged here and I take advantage to reconnect with good people and sharpen my focus. I charge up a hill shouting "I am a fucking RUNNER." I shout this in my head so that other people don't think I'm strange and I don't alarm the wildlife. When I get to the top I swear I see the light at the end of the tunnel.
Or is it a false dawn?

sun shining like falling rain

  • Tuesday, July 24, 2012
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 I've been  off the grid for a while, clandestine and as silent as a spy. The emotional and physical toll at the end of the school year causing my mind to skate over the surface of things, paralysing. I was too tired to think much beyond sleep, work and sleep. There has been some running, as sporadic as a shotgun blast but no blogging. Non essentials shelved in the name of survival.

Yesterday my holiday starts. I enter woods as cool and dark as a cathedral and I am Benedictine in my approach, silent, solitary and contemplative. I bend to my run with purpose my blood singing hymns to the earth. This is a run with intent, a shackle breaker and I go hard in the heat, every stride breaking another negative link, carrying me away from the last few weeks and toward lightness. It is paradoxical running, the more I hurt the freer I feel. There is spirituality, purging, travail and freedom, and there is liturgy in running a route that is as familiar as a lovers face under a sun shining like falling rain.

I've struggled this year, I've been flat and demotivated and running has been a chore interspersed with a few brilliant bursts. In five years of running this is the first time I've seriously considered throwing in the towel and giving up. I don't believe I will but I need to source a solution first.