Nothing august in August here.

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

I was finally shamed into it. Firstly all my old race numbers began falling off my man-cave wall (surely some serious symbolism there), then someone unknown to me used my race entry in the annual City To Surf and posted a really terrible time.

There was nothing for it, therefore, but to lace up the old dusty runners and hit the streets again. But after another night of no sleep at all, a penance for crimes unknown that seems to hit me out of the blue every couple of weeks or so, I was up at 4 a.m. feeling at odds with my lot. Still, the fire of new-found enthusiasm burns bright, and so under the equally brilliant light of a supermoon, I headed off into the night.

Straight away it felt brilliant to be running again, and creaky, wheezy and as slow as it was, I can honestly say I enjoyed every second of it. Just a gentle 5.2km outing, but after weeks of no running at all, was as refreshing as a plunge in a sparkling pool on a stinking hot day. Just lovely.

And so a line, not just any line, but a firm, thick, black heavy one has been ruled under the training log and we start again. Once more. I don’t know how many times I’ve been here, but too many. It’s a joy and a privilege however to be able to do this – to just dust myself off and start again. I’m all too aware now as the knees get creakier and the aches and pains of simply living seem more pronounced and less inclined to disappear, that the day will come when the line under the training log means “never to run again”. I hope that is still some decades away, but in the meantime I don’t take my relative good health and general fitness for granted, and so I carry on, and cheerfully so.

I’ll see how the body holds up over the next 48 hours, but assuming all is well, I can still perhaps salvage a half-marathon at the up-coming Sydney Running Festival on September 21st. But we’ll see. For the moment I’m just happy to be running again.