Confessions of a deprived runner

These past several days haven’t been kind to me.  Ok, confession, it’s actually several weeks. Or months, maybe. Or…gasp, shudder…maybe even a year or two. Before I get all carried away and bang my head on the table and wonder what the fuck I’m doing with my life, I just wanted to clarify that, well…these right here are unkind days.

It’s been ages since I’ve answered nature’s call. You’d be frustrated, too, if, like me, you simply could not bring yourself to go.  Each time I make an attempt and get so close to the moment of cathartic release I could practically smell it, something crops up that makes me painfully withdraw. 

Oh wait…I didn’t mean, you know, that nature’s call. I was being more literal. Like being out in real nature. Trees and stuff. And the smell, you know, of grass and hills. Not, umm, the smell of the release…if that’s what you were thinking.

Well, anyways, leaving all that behind…aside, I mean…the point is I haven’t traveled for as long as I can remember. My bike, therefore… my once faithful travel companion, balm to my bleeding soul …is now just the thing that gets me, greasy-handed and mildly annoyed, to the office cubicle. And since there’s no travel, the blog is quietly rusting away into oblivion.

My only respite, therefore, my shining angel in the midst of Pandora’s Box, lay in my running.  It offered me a regular escape from the daily drudgery. No matter how dull the day, so long as I had my run the future held promise and the past, elation. 

For 3 mornings each week, I was blissfully free. I flew like the wind, joyous, nimble, and fleet-footed and…well, actually I wasn’t that fleet-footed. I kind of plodded along for a bit, somewhat slow and heavy, and well…mildly irregular, maybe…like the monsoon wind, perhaps…but anyways, I was free.

While, in theory, I’ve been running for years, I was always rather nonchalant about it. I’d run for probably a month before an event, without a fixed schedule or target, throw in a blah performance in said event, and hobble around for a week or two after…the extent & duration determined by, among other things, the number of people that noticed me hobble. Rinse, repeat. I did have a blast though, which more than justified the nonchalance.

Recently, though, things have changed a bit. I grew tired of the predictability and set myself some challenging goals. Like not being overtaken by girls. Well, the fat ones, at least. I would get better, I resolved. Leaner, meaner, faster.

Therefore, after I was done pirating running e-books and training plans that promised wonderful things (think “Run like the wind” & “How I beat my Personal Best by 2 hours”) I chose one that sounded suitably glamorous and started down the long, arduous road to excellence.

And, to my own immense surprise, found myself still on the road 8 weeks later.

I was on my own little journey of exploration, conquering new unknowns. I learnt to run at paces faster than I had run before, and to sustain them for longer distances. I grew better at combating fatigue. I learnt which complaints of the body to ignore and which ones to listen to. I worked on silencing my mind and pushing out negative thoughts. One day’s disappointment invariably turned into the next day’s achievement. Along the way I made modest gains. Broke my personal records for the 5 & 10K. Achieved speeds that, while not remotely brag-worthy, were beyond my reach as recently as 6 months ago. And I loved everything about it. I spent nights coercing myself and woke up with a sense of purpose and expectancy. Watched little flycatcher birds flit low around my feet as I headed out. Once I started running, it was like I was filming my own personal blockbuster movie – suspense, romance, pain, drama,  heartbreak, tragedy and triumph – all packed into the next hour or two. And finally, to trudge back home, red-faced, drenched in sweat, bathed in the warm afterglow of a successful workout…those were the moments that elevated each day into the realms of the extraordinary.  Days and nights became the long gaps between two runs. In my mind’s eye, my training was starting to take on Balboa-esque proportions. Only a matter of time before I could finally cry out “Yo Mickey….we done it! I love you Aaydrian”

And then, just like Forrest Gump, I stopped running one day.

Unlike Forrest Gump though, I stopped running because of a shin splint.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about a shin splint: Defined as "Pain along the inner edge of the shinbone (tibia)." Shin splints are a common injury affecting athletes who engage in running sports or other forms of physical activity, including running and jumping. It affects mostly runners and accounts for approximately 13% to 17% of all running-related injuries.

Here’s what I have to say about a shin splint: A malevolent disease, born of the unholy union of the devil and his pet cockroach. A curse on all mankind. A living, growing, vermin inside your leg that feeds off your hopes and dreams and drowns you in despair. A sly, mocking creature that withdraws into its corner each day, only to pounce gleefully, explosively back at every little forward leap of the leg. It scoffs at your weakness and drives you, raging and seething, to the edge of madness.

Turns out I probably wasn’t as good as listening to my body as I thought I was. So here I am now, nursing an injured leg, not to mention a wounded psyche, with an icepack as my new best friend. The only real physical activity being my daily post-lunch games of table tennis. While I do get the satisfaction of seeing a large blob of sweat in my left armpit at the end of it, there’s really no comparison. It’s like going out for a week with Katrina Kaif, and then suddenly finding yourself next to Saif Ali Khan playing the cross-dressed waitress in Humshakals. It’s simply not the same thing.

Lacing my shoes each morning. Stepping out into the freshly-laundered air. A mellow pinkish glow diffusing the grey of the sky. The quiet sounds of my rhythmic breathing and the steady percussion of my feet. The soft squelch of mud under my running shoes, and gentle odor that indicates it probably wasn’t mud. Seeing the sun rise, a fiery orange ball rolling up out of a garbage strewn hill. Looking downwards, and sideward, and marveling at the sexiest shadow in the world. Leaping over puddles and dodging/fleeing packs of stray dogs. Passing by the old, fat, sedentary uncle on the park bench who gives me a look of open admiration bordering on the obscene, and who then grabs my sweat-soaked hand in both of his and says, in a slow, ardent drawl “It is sooo wondderrrful to see you run like that maa”. The rush of exuberance and the feeling of utter invincibility when it’s all over. These are experiences that define a man’s life, and I sorely miss every one of them.

It’s been a fortnight since my last run, and I cannot wait to get back.