Thursday was my running day. So was Tuesday and Wednesday, but I overslept on one and it rained on the other. No more excuses. So leaving the house about 7pm, I jogged towards my starting point – the road junction in front of my block. The skies were already a shade of dark blue. The Green Man lit up and I kicked off.
It is only less than a km to the Ulu Pandan Canal, so I will usually start my run from home. The route I run takes me along the busy Clementi Road into the quiet and scenic Ulu Pandan Canal jogging track. You get to see all kinds of people here. There are the casual joggers like me, pet lovers who takes time out to bring Doggy for a stroll, one particular woman who pushes her two furry canines in her pram, a group of inline skaters who zips up and down the stretch, old couples out for after-dinner walks, and an old man who easily out-paces me with a Jack Russell in tow (yeah the dog can sure run too).
Running is not exactly a sport that I use to enjoy. It used to be a boring and joyless exercise that lacked any sense of competitiveness that other sports brought with them. I would have rather played some foreign unknown sport than to impose my body to this sport that relies on repetitive leg motion and a good lung capacity.
But as all working people soon realize, that gathering a group of old friends to loyally meet-up every week for a game of hard-court soccer or badminton is no easy task. Other priorities and petty excuses soon rob us of finding a common time to play the game we love. So that was how I turned to the sport that I used to avoid for my weekly dose of exercise.
I still find it hard sometimes to find the motivation to go running after work. But as soon as my feet start pounding on the cemented pathway, I feel a sense of escape as my sub-conscious mind takes over. That‘s why I like running in the evening after twilight. The dark surroundings allow my mind to wander freely and not to focus on personal problems or on the tiredness of the body. By not focusing on the struggle between the will (spirit) and body (physical), I can now slowly improve my running distance too.
1 comment:
Jogging is not a very healthy sport, with all that repetitive impact damaging and wearing down your joints, and risking your tendons and ligaments.
What people need is an aerobic running exercise. What people do is running with bad form. And what they get is a torture -fest for the knees. :P
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