We Shall Not Cease From Exploration...
Having been very thorough in my collecting up of what needed washing I found I had no running kit this morning...!
I considered going running in bikini top and Anadi's boxers... I even got dressed into them, and then decided to swim a mile in my pants instead...
I am now back in my cafe enjoying a cafe con leche, having collected the bag of washing holding just about all the clothes we own...
Not owning many clothes reminds me a bit of school days and school uniform, not much decision to be made each day...
We wore grey school skirts, and a grey jumper, then there was the choice of a blue, yellow, or green airtex shirt...
It was all very simple, and due to my penchant for getting off the bus to run home from school, it also served as running kit too.
All I did was change out of my school shoes into green flash gym shoes...
Why ever did I even hesitate to run in Anadi's boxer shorts?
Thinking back I ran in whatever I was wearing a lot of the time, if I wanted to get somewhere quicker, I would run and it was customary to find me outside at a party racing the boys...
It was the seventies and there was a fashion for wearing long skirts... I can remember one party in particular sitting on the steps with a group of people outside on a warm summer night...
I was wearing a little yellow top and a long blue skirt with yellow flowers in the print...
One of the boys said he was sure he could beat me in a running race up the road....
The gauntlet was thrown. I tucked my skirt into my pants and we were off...
I can't for the life of me remember who won...
Another time my friend Simon who weighed a goodly amount bet me that I couldn't carry him piggy back style for 400 metres...
Of course I rose to the challenge, and I did it... Even though it was agony hard work, I would not give in. I loved stretching myself...
I always enjoyed challenges for the sake of challenges, just to see if I could. I didn't mind whether I could or I couldn't, and I can remember that this released me to completely put every ounce of effort in...
This freedom paradoxically left me along the way when I realised how good I was at running, and that the outcome somehow mattered...
The first 'serious' 800 meter race I ran as free as a bird, aged fifteen years old, and unbeknownst to me the time I ran immediately ranked me 18th in the UK...
Pressure started to come into my running.
The need to perform up to what was expected... And something changed...
The joy of finding out what was possible was replaced by the tension of trying to live up to something...
But because running and striving and stretching had all started from a place of free expression, and because first and foremost I have been an explorer always - I have been able to return to a place I once knew and to now fully enjoy and fully know....
"We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." - T. S. Eliot
