A disappointing attempted long run today, but there’s no disgrace attached. It wasn’t for lack of effort or commitment. If anything, the opposite.
I woke yesterday with a feverish brow, throat like sandpaper, and lungs full of wheezey phlegm. I’ll resist the schoolboyish temptation to be even more graphic. But it wasn’t pleasant.
Today the corporeal thermostat was a few degrees lower, with the throat less raw and sore. At any other time I’d have opted to give myself another rest day but I’m starting to glance anxiously at the Boston clock, and know that I need to pull out some long runs. So up I got and out I went. As early as 2 or 3 miles I started to suspect it wasn’t going to work, but I carried on, along the canal towards Reading. This is the opposite direction from usual. Not as pretty or as tranquil. The pedestrians appear more murderous and urban than their counterparts on the Newbury stretch; their children more savage and resentful; their dogs more pugnacious and irascible. It was this part of the towpath that slaughtered my fattened calf on Boxing Day, which gives me further reason to feel apprehensive.
Today was a great opportunity for redemption, but the chance was missed. A couple of miles in, I had a coughing fit that forced me to pull up. I set off again a minute later, but was already accepting that this was going to be no 12 or 15 miler. To compress the story, I ended up with 7.4 miles, which in the circumstances, I was happy with. I won’t pretend this was a long run or a stepback week. I can’t afford to do that. Instead, I’ll think of it as another steady fitness run, and aim to reschedule my long run for a couple of days, or whenever this wheezey chest has cleared up. I won’t crucify myself over not getting the long run I needed. Given the circumstances, I’d rather be pleased that I made the effort to get out there and do something, despite having a great excuse to stay at home. Looking at it that way, 7½ miles is just fine. That makes only 19 miles for the week, but the pins feel stronger than they did last Sunday, so let’s look on the bright side.
Missed another QPR home game yesterday. Annoying. I have a season ticket, so I’ve paid for all these games, whether I see them or not. We lost though, which sort of makes me glad I wasn’t there. So is the annoyance of paying the money without receiving the goods, bigger than the relief I feel at not being there to witness a defeat? A tricky one, but I go for the latter.
The reason for my absence was an AmDrams experience, supporting an old friend, Barry Serjent, in his role as Tobias in Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance. The East Lane Theatre, in Wembley, is a remarkable success. This amateur theatre group had to leave their old home in the mid-80s, when the church hall they used was being redeveloped. Faced with the prospect of having to disband after 50 years, they decided instead to build their own theatre. Yes, build, as in turning a bare patch of land into a proper auditorium with plush seats. Since then, they’ve added a smart bar, dressing rooms, foyer… Even more astonishing is that 95% of the planning, building and decorating has been done by the group members in their own time. Twenty years ago, when I worked in the wine business, I ran some tutored tastings to help sponsor some of the work. I’m also a seat sponsor. Somewhere among the 70 or so is one with my name on the back. I’m proud to have played some small part in its success.
The play was rather unsatisfying though. Albee is something of a wordsmith, so it’s possible to close your eyes and float along on the language. But as a dramatist, I don’t know where he was hoping to get with this play. If I thought that posterity, or anyone reading this now, would have any interest in my fractured interpretation of its subliminal message, I would extend this paragraph. But I don’t, so I won’t.
I’ve been feeling a bit sorry for myself the last few days for various reasons, but today I saw something that gave me the good slap I needed. As I reached the lock on the canal close to the point where I was to leave it, I saw by the water’s edge, a long line of wreaths and smaller bunches of flowers, attached to many of which were innocent messages of regret and despair. It seems that a 15 year old schoolboy had gone missing on his way to school last month. Three weeks later, his body was found in the canal at this spot. Later internet research tells me that the police are still unsure what happened to him. But to read some of the tributes, and to imagine what his parents must be experiencing, was enough to hoist my eyelids, and to see the world in a different light. My anxieties over work and the marathon and a host of other things, are actually pretty trivial.
Running, and its reality electrodes, do their job once again.
