
Horses from Woolwich Barracks are quite an uplifting sight on a March morning in Greenwich Park
Sometimes the relentless cheeriness of my twitter feed, especially the happy bunnies I tend to follow (parkrun buddies, running club comrades, nature writers, gardeners, treehuggers and vegans) can catch me on the raw. I’m sure I’m not the only one who excuses herself from the twitter party when life isn’t going so well.
A series of half-arsed attempts at training runs, in the mistaken belief that a lack of pain when jogging along with clients or taking part in a spinning class means that I can pick up my pace and distance, have ended in (near) tears. Unmistakeable Achilles/calf pain kicks in after a few miles, and is now accompanied by non-specific knee crunching and glute pain. I am just one big pain.
So I volunteer at parkrun (instead of running) and to be a bag lady at the London Marathon (checking in runners’ belongings on the baggage trucks). I excuse myself from pacer duties at one half marathon and wonder if I can race another (one of my favourites, the Paddock Wood Half, it’s on 2 April).
I try to keep cheerful, but found myself wobbly lipped as a bade my excited and deliriously happy daughter farewell as she shoulders her rucksack en route to Ho Chi Minh City to stay with friends. And I clench my jaw as I read on twitter that today is the International Day of Happiness.
Not if you’re an injured empty nester who relies on running endorphins to get to her happy place, it isn’t.