Dreams of Running

So, no updates here for about two and a half months.  Largely because there has been no running for me.

The foot injury I mentioned refused to get better and, being a bloke, I chose to wait it out and so it was another month and more before I sought medical attention.  During this time, I hardly ran at all but had a few other bumps along the way. 

The short story is: I got a stress fracture in my foot.  When the same foot was later squashed, that turned into a proper fracture.

So, I’ve been doing even less running (um, zero actually) while I wait for the break to heal.  A couple of weeks ago, I was cleared for cycling.  I’m not a fan but it’s a way to recoup a little of the endurance fitness and so I persist.  This weekend, I plan an experimental foray into running.  Perhaps as much as a kilometre.  If that goes well, I just know the difficulty will lie in keeping progress slow, managed and steady.  The temptation to do otherwise will be enormous, though.

Hmm.  Time for a subject change.  Want to go run.  Now. 

This is why I haven’t blogged much.  It’s like having a particularly persistent mosquito bite.  Leave it alone and you always know it’s there.  But scratch it at all.  Even just touch it lightly.  Once.  And suddenly, there’s an all-consuming need to scratch that itch.

During the intervening weeks, I took a friend to her first marathon.  An event, in fact, that I had been going to run in myself.  She repaid my kindness by blasting out her debut in 3h31m.  Some people; no consideration.  ;-)  Mind you, it wasn’t so hard to decide not to run that day.  I could hardly walk at the time and even hobbling around from point to point offering support nearly finished me.

Which brings me (finally) to the title of this post:  Just recently, I have actually started to dream about running.  Not sanitary-towel-advert, super-idealised running.  Just running.  Running in the sun, in the rain, in the snow.  Running on roads, paths, trails and across fields. Running up hill and down dale.  Everything, now I come to think of it, except running on a treadmill.

The dreams don’t have a prologue.  Nor do they bleed out into some kind of weird metaphorical horror involving seabirds, soylent green ice cream and a very large aspirin.  (I really don’t want to have that one again, I can tell you.)

And during my waking hours, I keep thinking about just getting back after work, putting on a pair of shoes and setting off for a few hours.  Every day that it rains, I think about running tomorrow.  And when it doesn’t, I think about running today.  I want to run so much that I can almost taste it.

Soon.  Soon, my oh-so-neglected running shoes, we shall be reunited on the trail. 

Yes.  Yes, we will.

Soon.