Modern Day Adam And Eve
I received an email from my friend Jim this morning...
Jim and I have run many many miles together; Six years ago we trained together through a whole winter to run different ultras on the same day in the April; me a 100k event in Copenhagen and he a fifty two mile event in the Scottish Highlands...
We ran for hours and hours and hours. One cold and frosty morning two hours into a five hour run, we hadn't said a word, we had met at the lamb at 6am and run a wide circle around Eastbourne and along the seafront until as the sun rose we were now climbing up onto the downs
'Our friendship has reached new levels ' I commented to Jim ' to be able to run along and not speak at all...'
Jim laughed and said ' I haven't been speaking before Ju ' !!! :)
Before that we had trained with our friend Rob, to run the inaugural cross country race from London to Brighton in October 2008... Stu who won the race outright trained with us sometimes too, and on one occasion we all went on a reccy of the course with the map we had been sent in our pre race package so that we wouldn't get lost!!
And therein lies a whole other story, there is a point in this video ( link)
Where I say ' I have never felt so awful in the whole of my life..' Jim and I had just emerged from getting lost in the woods having run for 40 minutes in circles, this feels a lot on a 56 mile run ! :)
And at that point I had never felt so awful in the whole of my life!! Now of course that sounds very dramatic - and it passed...
I found that race such a mirror of life, so many different emotions, challenges, experienced along the way and running along it is vital to allow them to arise and then to let them go...
This way we remain in the present and the awful moments pass, like the wonderful ones, and we can clear any attachment to them as we run along ensuring our footsteps remain light and we leave no trace...
In his email, Jim said that he and his wife Carol had been saying that aAnadi and I remind them of a modern day Adam and Eve natural and explorative with no known destination and outcome...
We must be even more aware to watch for those snakes on the path...!
Today we have had a rest day!
We have stayed in a Orchid resort all day, just hanging out and working, chatting , eating nice food... and the day has passed with sunny ease.
Last night we celebrated our dot dot dot anniversary with a pink and a blue cocktail and as we sat sipping them, a group of four young men asked us to take a photograph of them they were setting off for the full Moon party, they looked so vibrant and healthy as they left....
At around 10am this morning three of them appeared for breakfast from their apartment looking a bit quiet and depleted...
'I wonder where their friend is?' I said ....
Two hours later, I was going down the steps and I met him coming up them, looking just as vibrant and alive as last night; with colourful paint all over him... The trademark of attending a full moon party...
'I've just got back' he said to me with a big smile...
'You're looking very good on it' I said 'must have been a good party!'
