Choices

As I stood in the open doorway the cold wind blew the rain in against my face, I looked out at the dark grey sky through the rain and in exasperation invoked one word “Bugger!” I closed the front door and started to get ready for my long Sunday run of 21 miles. It was going to be harder today than in the past; for the last two weeks I had been on a very strict no carbohydrate diet and was now fully feeling the effect on my body, a lack of energy and an inability to be warm. My coach Rory had placed me on the diet when I went to see him, I need to get lean, very lean in order to run in the heat of the Namib desert. So far I had lost four Kilograms of fat in two weeks. My body is now running on empty, my training regime is stringent; for the last two weeks I have trained six days a week with weights in the gym and running, in those two weeks I have run 89.2 miles.
I was in London again, over for the weekend to surprise my old friend Sean for his birthday and so found myself the next day driving to Richmond park in the freezing rain to start my long training run for the week. I entered the giant nature reserve that was once Henry the Eighths hunting ground and as I turned up the hill I was aware of how few people were about. My car pulled up in the empty car park above the Isabella plantation and as I turned off the engine the sound of the rain began to patter against the windscreen. With a deep breath I reminded myself that no matter if it was a summers day or a day like today that by the end of it I would be soaked either way, and with that I climbed out of my car and locked the door. I put on my backpack that contained the water that I would be drinking over the next four and a half hours and gently padded away from my car in to the woods.
Theres something about running in the rain that is amazingly relaxing, as if all ones stress is being washed away and as I found my stride and pace my breathing settled in to the old familiar rhythm my lungs filling with the clear, clean air. I smiled to myself as I felt my muscles warming up even as my clothes began to soak through, I chose to do this.
After several miles there is a break in the rain, as my clothes start to steam as they are warmed by my body heat and the sun I crest the ridge of a hill to see the steam rising from the backs of some nearby deer who look up for a moment quizzically before going back to grazing on the long green rain soaked grass. The sun lifts my spirits as I run on, I love that I chose to do this and enjoy that I have the park almost to myself. Even as the rain begins to fall again gently at first I choose to smile and feel lifted again as the most vivid rainbow appears in front of me. I run on happy in the freezing rain, it is my choice to do so.
My three year old niece Lucy asked me a week ago ‘Uncle Jamile, what do you think about when you are running?’ As I ran on past the fourteen mile mark I thought about her question.
Sometimes I am thinking about how the run is going, what I am seeing in front of me and all around me, my experience of the moment. Other times when the pain kicks in and the bitter cold bites down hard through my fingers and around my head I let my mind travel and think about why I am doing this, why I have chosen to do this. At these times my mind turns to a poem, it was written by Lynn McKenna who died aged 15, its called Lynn’s Dreams, this is it:

I wish I could learn,
Like everyone else,
I wish I could swim, jump and run,

I wish different cards could have been dealt,
I wish it could be like old fun.
I wish I could grow and learn about life,

I wish I could feel well again,
I wish that there was an end to the strife,
And a new beginning instead.

But destiny’s come and its drawing me near,
And I know my two ANGELS are there,
With them I will have no reason for fear, In their warm embrace and their care.

So when I run and it hurts, when the pain in my hips is so bad that its screaming at me to stop and my fingers begin to feel like they will never thaw; I remember Lynn’s poem and remember how privileged I am to be able to run, and to feel that pain; and I remember that I have chosen to do this and I push on.

In the words of Jane, Lynn’s mother the LauraLynn Foundation is all about ‘Putting life into a child’s day, and not days into a child’s life, it’s all about choices’