'We Will Make Our Sun Run...'
We are in the car coming back from celebrating the marriage of my friend David to Jenny...
His daughter Alex and I were remembering the first day we met...
It was 1989... 'I remember you had black and white nail varnish' I said... 'Oh yes, I used to paint my nails white and then draw on them in black felt tip... Which meant my left hand had intricate drawing and my right hand black stripes! You were dressed as a chicken' she continued....
'Why were you dressed as a chicken...?' Anadi asked, 'It was Red Nose Day, and to raise money, I was dressed as a chicken' I explained.... Spencer Newport who worked in the gym with us was dressed as a fox.... He was a young up and coming international runner of about 22 and I was an international runner aged 29... I was given a start and then ran there and back along the long drive... A distance of around a mile.... Spencer set off at the allotted time, worked out on our mile times...
Bets were placed....
The chefs stood at the ready... If I lost I was to be cooked...!
The excitement was huge, a crowd gathered... Everyone entered in to the spirit of the chase....
With my lungs and legs burning I had nearly reached 'safety' when the fox pounced in the final 30 meters....
The chefs swooped and I was held aloft amidst much cheering and laughter...
David and Maureen, his wife, were inaugural members of the gym Nigel and I ran at Buxted Park . They were also amongst the very first members of Utopia Runners running club which I started way back then...
They were an integral part of the community and supported every event I organised, and never missed a training session...
Sadly Maureen became ill, and then died in 1994....
But, now 21 years later, today is a happy day... At the age of 80 David, looking fit and handsome, walked up the aisle with Jenny, and after a beautiful service we returned to their home to drink champagne and eat cake!
Nearly seventeen years ago I was meeting Alex with her new baby William in the Griffin pub; she arrived and put the little thing in my arms... 'Please will you be his Godmother..?' She asked... I was honoured, and now he is much bigger than both of us!
And so life's journey continues... From birth to death we go, but along the way it is about the relationships we have with one another, the enduring nature of love and living our life to the full...
One of my favourite poems by Andrew Marvell 'To His Coy Mistress' concludes with him saying that even though we can't make the sun stand still, we can make him run...!
'Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball,
And tear our pleasure with rough strife
Through the iron gates of life:
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we we will make him run.'
