So, I'm back in Hampshire for a brief time. I'm enjoying that my bedroom is actually dark at night, I can see the stars, and the loudest sound is a chinook coming over from Popham airfield. My parents respect my pretentious notions as a writer, and have not yet questioned the strange set-up in their sunlounge of a rug, the charger for my iPad and a stack of play scripts (as well as David Edgar's 'How Plays Work' which is as inspiring as it is informative) where I am composing the final act of my play. I keep my guitar close by, and have the plot written on post-it notes, which are stuck to the side of my Dad's desk. However, what I am not enjoying is that Basingstoke has hills that before I moved to London, I had no idea existed. I went out for a run this morning and, granted, I've been unwell and had taken a week off to rest a weird ache in my left foot (should I be worried? I'm a little worried...) so am not up to a great level of fitness, but that was tougher than it should have been. Upon turning a corner and facing yet another incline, an expression close to, "oh you are kidding me" definitely escaped my mouth.
When it was finally over, I stopped on a patch of grass to stretch. An older woman walking her dog passed by and she said, "I wish I could still do that!" (I was hanging upside down) "I still go to the gym, you know, but none of that, none of this running." and without wishing to insult her, I thought, well why don't you? I have been overtaken by enough older men while running by Regent's Canal to know that an upper-age limit is entirely subjective. I think that a lot about running is a frame of mind. After my week off, it took watching three Nike adverts on YouTube to get me back out of the door and when I've been running since school, you'd think it would just be routine. But the idea of pushing my body and mind in that way, knowing that it is important to me that I do, is a lot of pressure for 8 o'clock in the morning. When discussing running with a friend last year, we laughed over the fact that you have to make the time between deciding to run and actually running as short as possible. Do not question it, that's my best advice. And of course it is not for everyone, but those with any inclination towards it should just, go. Just put on a pair of trainers and see what happens, regardless of age or how unfit you think you are.
With this in mind, I return to tackling the hills of Basingstoke. They're really not that steep, I'm just not used to them anymore. And if I'm here for three weeks, the key is not to weep in the corner with aching thighs. I know that at the top of a hill by Worting Wood is a gorgeous view over fields of farmland and I'm dying to see it again. If I make it, I'll post a photo on here. In the meantime, I'll return to finishing my play, which suddenly feels like a much less arduous task...
