There could hardly be a greater contrast in running environments than my weekday and weekend routes. On Tuesday I went out along the banks of the Regent's Canal, past derelict factories and workshops, past school playgrounds where children yelled and shouted, past a block of flats where a woman bellowed at someone, a child, a lover, or a husband, in impenetrable patois. In the cold there were few others around, a couple of runners, a dog-walker or two, and the hooded young men who frequent inner-city canal banks, passing sweet-scented cheroots to one another. I am afraid I can only claim two runs this week.
And today, I took a sciatic trudge around Seaford Head. I had woken the previous morning barely able to move with lower back pain, though it became tolerable as I got up and started to move around. Today I felt a little better, though still conscious of stiffness, and I found I was slow. Nevertheless, even if I have a relapse tonight, it was worth it to breathe the cold air, and to see from the top of Seaford Head a dark edge of cloud out to sea, trimmed on the top with upward-rising fingers of cloud, pink as they caught the setting sun.
