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Rest

There were many plans in 2020. To travel, to live, to do things together – all cancelled from a pandemic. But maybe it’s to make way for something we didn’t plan – to rest?

My schedule pre-COVID-19 has always been manic. Meeting friends, volunteering, church, work, travel, exercising….. I rarely have time to be home. Home is a place where I do basic necessities and host people. I spend most of my time being with other people, being together. When lockdown started in the UK back in March, I had a rough time adjusting, like many other people I suppose. but it gave me some time to do the things I never scheduled: to rest.

Finally days ahead of me where I have no schedules. Days to lay down on the sofa and enjoy a good book. Days to learn sewing because I feel like it. Days to sit down and talk with friends on the phone for hours when I don’t feel like doing anything. Days where I can just do nothing on the sofa when period fatigue hits. Nothing. Nothing. I can’t remember the last time that happened. I even get some time to be reflecting on my activities and my hectic life, and start reflecting on how they impact me. Maybe I am really doing too much, and piling too many stuff into my already crazy life.

It wasn’t an easy adjustment, I have to say. But 4 months later, I can say it did some good flushing to the system. I even start writing, contemplating about life. I feel more energetic. I haven’t got sick since March. I try to reduce my activities and start handing over so that when life goes back to normal (whenever that is), hopefully I will take some learning from 2020 lockdown and finally schedule some more downtime in this life. There are unlimited amount of things to be doing on this planet. The only question we have is which one do we eliminate. Life is never meant to be robotic, to always be moving on. Take your time to rest. Rejuvenate. Recover. Enjoy the little things in life.

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First 2020 Parkrun!

It’s weirdly warm for January, albeit terribly windy. So today I gathered myself and headed to the park for my first parkrun in 2020.

This year I’ve been toying with the idea of half marathon. I feel like I need a challenge. For a few years I have been doing swimathon, as the name suggests, a swimming marathon event. I’ve done the longest distance in swimathon (5k) so I feel that part is now ‘conquered’. I did 10k too in Manchester in 2018. Last year I didn’t do anything, but I watched my friends running marathons in Munich and I was inspired. I live in a pretty idillyc location for training, surrounded by beautiful hills, 5 mins from a park, a canal behind my office with running paths, and surrounded by running freaks in office who run 10k in their lunch breaks. Can’t think of more ideal situation to take up running. Then I stumbled on sparkasse marathon in Germany, running beside a gorgeous lake in a flat terrain across 3 countries. And it’s in autumn so I can train in spring and summer. It ticks all my boxes for a marathon. I am inclined to think that marathon is a stretch, and I should probably do a half marathon first for this time. Anyhow it all seems to fall together nicely.

So here I am, first 2020 parkrun. Parkrun is not a foreign idea for me, I’ve run a few of them in Manchester and in Huddersfield.

It started pretty well, I ran at steady pace and didn’t stop too often. Though running through crazy wind wasn’t easy. I had to stop about 3x during the entire run. The park is not the flattest in the world, we had some inclines and descends throughout. Obviously loving the descends and hating the inclines, I had to stop and walk on the hills since I can feel my calf tightening up more than I prefer.

I finished with general happy post running thoughts, satisfaction that I finished the run, and much trepidation of what is going to happen in October if I decided to run a half marathon, let alone a marathon. Surely I have lots of training needed, but at this point, also enough time to train (I hope)

Parkrun calculation just came up. 34 mins 18 seconds. Not too terrible, but I’ve definitely done better. Much training needed if I’m going to be running 21 km this autumn, but I’m optimistic it will be fine.