Dashed

“Science and art, or by the same token poetry and prose, differ from one another like a journey and an excursion. The purpose of the journey is its goal, the purpose of an excursion is the process.”

Franz Grillparzer

‘O for that warning voice’ writes Milton at the opening of Paradise Lost book IV. Of course the warning voice he requests could and should have been provided by the spuriously omniscient god whose atrocious misdeeds Milton expressly sought to condone; mine on the other hand could easily have been provided by an appeal to common sense and experience – and yet we would surely all have punctured an artery if we paid serious heed to either.

So it was that I agreed to stride from retirement, to resume once more the splintering fatigue of physical exertion. I previously completed the Dolphin Dash (all six miles) in May 2007. At the time I was convinced that four miles walking a day (weather permitting) to work and back was more than adequate preparation, although a few practice runs soon put paid to that risible fancy. It would be dilatory to spiral into too much detail, but it suffices to note that calf pain, shin splints, crunching knee joints and simmering blood blisters were the legacy of that brief athletic career.

Since then I tried and failed to revive a desire to run on several fitful occasions – without the specific goal of training for a race, I could find little impetus to trot for half a kilometre before accepting easier ways to waste my life.

What then changed my mind? Was it simply the erosion of sense, the forgetting of former hardships in hope of future glory (hope which, as Turandot so acutely avers, always deludes)? Such speculations are for other times, for the fact is that my mind was altered (plus ça change).

Training, such as it was, was no more fun than before, although it did provide me with the specious reasoning to eat more chocolate (as if two minutes of running could expiate a chunky Kit Kat). My shin splints were more painful than my memory (usually so incisive when it comes to pain) allowed, and I was obliged to resort to such trickery as walking on one’s heels (the experts swear by it) to render my lower legs more elastic. To my credit, not once did I force myself to go for a run before work. Some so-called experts will claim that early morning is the best time to exercise, and that half an hour’s running on an empty stomach is the key to staying thin (how silly – anorexia does the same, with much less effort). Forcing myself to move at all is almost intolerable before that first cup of tea has worked its magic, and even then the will to stand up is barely worth the trouble. Sometimes almost a week would elapse without the flimsiest run, but it was disarmingly easy to inveigle myself into the pretence that mental preparation was just as crucial.

On the Friday before the Dash I was able to harness the anticipation, and propel myself for several kilometres without pause. Stomp, stomp, stomp. I told myself to think simply of the next step: the rhythm, steady and dull, must prevail. What a metaphor indeed for human life, that only the imposition of monotonous, laboured routine can give purpose to an otherwise bare and thankless yawning of time.

The morning of the Dash arose. As I composed myself, I did feel what I took to be an adrenalin rush (hindsight whispers to me that it was possibly an aneurism); while the buzz was undeniably vivifying, I was however mindful of the cautionary words of Bev Baker, viz. that one should never kill when angry, as the lapse of control and composure always yields mistakes. Was the heightened sensibility of anger different to any other head-rush? Both might prompt one to do something one would afterwards, in the cool crispness of reason, regret.

I had declined Susan’s kind offer of a lift to the starting point. The walk to the Dolphin is no strenuous trek (I used to dawdle as far on my regular treks to Mill House, an ordeal as lacerating to the spirit as the Dash would prove to the soles of my feet). I was there in 20 minutes, and I assured myself that such a warm up would stand me in good stead, even though the last thing I felt like doing after a brisk walk was to launch into a steady run for six miles. That said, there was little steady about my running once I’d kicked past mile two.

My previous Dash had seen grey skies and drizzle, which actually proved quite conducive – one is less likely to linger in the rain. This time however the sky was blue, and the sunshine warm. Mindful of exposure, I had already applied factor 30 to my pallid hide, and my sleepy eyes could droop and languish at will behind my sunglasses. I had my bottle of water, a pocket of glucose sweets, two anti-inflammatories concealed in a piece of tissue, and perhaps the greatest sustenance, a fresh playlist of motivational ditties on my ipod. I wondered how easy it would be to switch off one’s mind and run blindly, relentlessly, till the course was complete; but not having the requisite handgun to blow out my brains, I ground my teeth and prepared for the start.

And so it began. The lesson learnt from my former Dash was to pace myself – in 2007 I started briskly, and took great pleasure in overtaking seemingly healthier specimens, but peaked too soon and could quite happily have keeled over by mile 3. This time I started slower, unburdened by any need to overtake. Yet the realisation that I wasn’t actually running very fast began to vex me, and I derived little assurance from the fact that, measured though my pace was, hardly anyone was overtaking me (and no, this was not because I was in fact last). As I plodded on, it hit home that the whole thing was less exciting than 2007: the novelty was gone, and I was just another runner, with nothing to prove. Indeed, having proven that I could run (or at least hobble) six miles, the onus was now to improve on my previous performance. Thankless indeed is the task of appeasing one’s own expectations, should they ever break loose and surface for air.

I ran. Britney impelled me to Break the Ice, but I was more inclined to take said ice and drop it in a long glass of gin rather than shatter it with my velocity. Still I ran. My shins did not trouble me, my lungs did not wither from exhaustion. My feet however, rudely rejecting the support supposedly proffered by my special socks (cushioned in all the right places so as, theoretically, to obviate blisters), were stinging by mile two. Hmm. Maybe special socks were of little use, when the trainers I wore were over two years old, with barely any tread remaining. Hey ho. I stopped in my tracks, registered the full pain of burning blisters on each foot, looked slyly behind me to assure myself that no one was yet gaining speed, and fumbled in my pocket for a painkiller. Yes I know, athletes should avoid masking pain with drugs, lest they unwittingly exert themselves into aggravating the injury, but I wasn’t even half way, and besides, it wasn’t as though I was knocking back codeine (how I miss you, poor dispossessed cousin of smack) and running with a shin bone poking through my sock.

From then on it was painful to run. I had made the mistake of cutting my nails a few days before, so I could not even practice the old trick of digging claws into palms to distract from pain elsewhere. I was sorely unimpressed when I crossed the three mile mark and realised I had an equal distance ahead. Tempting though it was (and ever will be) to lapse into Macbeth-style brooding desolation, I was prompted to ask what would Kimberley do? For indeed my playlist had soared to the elysian heights of Girls Aloud, and who could not be inspired and enthralled by the example of our saintly girls teetering up Kilimanjaro (though presumably not in stilettos)? Would Cheryl allow a weeping blister (besides the one she married) to hamper her? No indeed.

On I stumbled, shrugging off my frustration that even running on tiptoe was not proving a success. I no longer noticed any mile-markers, and so grew oblivious to the distance between me and my journey’s end. I was by now running in fits and starts, rather than a seamless dash, but when I caught a glimpse of Helen gaining on me I derived the incentive I needed to run more and walk less. Even in pain, the competitive edge is not entirely obscured (back in 2007 I was miffed indeed when Susan and Helen overtook me after my initially promising start; indeed it was very unsportsmanlike of them not to let a gentle novice lead the way).

The final stretch, back along the Grand Union canal, did not see me gather and compress my remaining strength into a heroic sprint. Rather I began to feel that it mattered little, that it would soon be over and gladly forgotten, all efforts wasted like so many vain intentions. Usually such pervasive depression of sprits does not descend until a task is complete, but I am nothing if not pre-emptive when it comes to dejection (happiness, as Euripides so fluently opined, does not exist). Yet then, as if to chide my fractious mood, my ipod sallied into ABBA’s Voulez Vous. There were indeed people everywhere, a sense of expectation hanging in the air… Knowing now that the end was in sight, I pursed my angry lips and stamped to the bitter end, quickening my pace at last. Admittedly it was more to gratify and earn the applause of the idle spectators than to prove a point to myself that I broke into a sprint once the aforesaid idle mob were in view, but I did still enjoy a warm feeling when the lady at the finishing line congratulated me and placed a medal round my neck (and yet – would that it were a noose).

But where the endorphin rush? The elation? The relief? The deed, as Goethe tells us, is all, the glory nothing. True, I was relieved that I could stand still, but with the sudden stillness came the churlish disappointment that my time was 63 whole minutes. Pah, over an hour – no wonder I could not justify any sense of achievement (to hell with Goethe, I now wanted glory). Admittedly, I had knocked two minutes off my previous time, but back then I was a breathless amateur. In truth, such sentiments of spiteful self-recrimination were largely unconscious, as my attention was eagerly diverted by the table of bananas and chocolate bars – I was not going to deny that I had earned a chunky Kit Kat, at least.