Habits – friends or foes?

A sharp intake of breath… teeth sink into my bottom lip… my whole body tenses… bracing for the pain!I’m on my favourite early morning run along an unlit country lane with an uneven surface. It’s almost as if my body is braced for a potential sprained ankle as I run in...

‘This too shall pass’

‘Why won’t by Bluetooth headset connect… it was fine yesterday… ‘help’ says problem in airplane mode apparently… found it, sorted that… still won’t connect… Aargh!.. Windows 10 update… thank you very much!’‘This too shall pass’ were the words of a dear...

Accepting imperfection

The monotone cawing of a half-dozen or so rooks pulled for my attention. Loud, tuneless and repetitive, their calls disrupted my otherwise peaceful early morning walk. Frustrated with them for shattering my peace, I began to wish they were elsewhere.Their calls...

Consumed by the Assumed!

Consumed by the Assumed!‘Lying down… every single one of them… how odd… a little surreal… even eerie!’These were my thoughts on reaching the turning point of my run. I paused looking across a field scattered with cows, but on this early morning, they were all lying...

Weathering the weather!

‘Today it looks worse than it did yesterday… and that’s says something…’ was my thought when reading the weather forecast on my phone first thing in the morning.I watch the 2-minute local weather forecast clip which is updated every day. I also have the hour by hour...

Touching my pain

Whoa! This is strong today.I can trace the outline of what I sense is the shape of my pelvis deep into the muscle tissue. There is a sharp angle here… it feels like a curve there… as if my pain is illuminating the outline of the bone in the same way streetlights...

Autumn leaves

‘It took so long to get in, we just turned around in the end and left’… commented a colleague on a failed trip to Westonbirt last weekend. ‘Well, they are on restricted numbers, so my bookings will probably shrink likewise’… commented a local landlord on visiting...

Too much chocolate?

I was left feeling listless, flat and hopeless as I switched off the radio news bulletin. Phrases from the broadcast replayed in my mind: second spike… hospital cases rising… more lockdown measures… and Brexit! Just typing these words causes my brow to furrow and my...

The sound of silence

My run this morning reminded me of lockdown, not a single car in sight, silence pervading.As I set off, I became aware of a small number of birds singing. Not as many as in spring, but I was drawn to their cheeps and chirps, a nice distraction from my left leg...

What do I need in this moment?

Waking up in the mornings now, I am greeted with darkness on the other side of the curtains.My normal routine would see me pulling on a pair of trainers and heading out of the door for a short run, but this morning I just felt a bit different. Difficult to put my...