Winter Mornings

Between bleary eyes and sun rise.

I’m out on the footpath in my shorts. My legs are cold as I acclimatise, as I get ready to run. It is a tense moment, in anticipation of the pain to come, and the joy that brings.

My shorts feel snug around my arse and my thighs. I’m going for the sockless look, with short, short socks. Just runners, that’s how it looks.

I stretch a bit, then I start to run.

I feel slow and awkward to start off, but that soon drops away.

I soon get into rhythm, trying not to be too heavy footed.

Hasn't it been cold? My balls shrink away to nowhere when I go jogging in the mornings. The hairs on my legs bristle, as my bare skin gets use to the breeze, as the cold slaps my arse, and burns my throat. The cold air touches, reaches right down into and scratches, my lungs. My foggy head spins with the cold wind on my face. I'm all ankles and feet, until the steady rhythm comes, slowly, got to warm up, physically and mentally, and then the magic starts. 

The fragile beauty of the sunrise makes my heart beat faster. The curtain is lifted. Dark becomes light, so quickly. And I feel everything lift right up and I am running, thrup, thrup, thrup, not a fucken care in the world.

Sublime.

then it is light and still, just the clup, clup, clup of my feet on the footpath and the heave, heave, heave, of my breath in my lungs, out of me.

My feet are light, my legs are like clockwork, or pistons, or something. The footpath is clear. I am floating above it. I am a glider sailing down the street.  I am Aladdin flying his magic carpet. My legs are like giant springs, perfectly sprung. The deeper I breath, the healthier I feel.

My steps echo under the shop awnings. They sound thap, thap, thap, on the cross street, out in the open. I sail around corner. I float over driveways. I slalom bins on the footpath, it must have been rubbish day.

The park opens up and swallows me at the bottom of the hill. The air transforms, the smell of mulch, and leaves, and dirt, and grass pervades my nostrils. I am running under the trees. I am starting to warm up. My steps are even, my breathing calm, I am moving with ease, I feel good. I am glazed with sweat.

I pull off my shirt, the breeze is perfect. Just me against the entire world and I am winning. The park casually waves me through.

Back out onto the road. Running up the shopping strip. Two girls heading to work look back as I run past. They say something, not sure what, but I recognise the tone, it was hungry, what we like to hear. 

“You want a piece of this,” I say out loud. That makes me smile. That pushes me on. That’s why I’m doing it, don’t be fooled. This is not a health kick, it is to look good.

The shops are empty, the footpath cleared out just for me. That’s what I tell myself, anyway.

There is a delivery guy delivering bread. The cleaners are just finishing up.

Then I am at my street and I turn for home. My throats burns, my legs shake, as I stretch at my gate. I open it. The front door clicks behind me. I am giddy as I make it to the kitchen and water. I gulp it down. Some of it spills down over my chin and drip, drip, drips on the floor and I don't care.