Love songs 3: Perfect pairs

I'll admit it, I'd been inspired by Jessica Ennis. Proof that long legs are not always better than short ones. And despite my desire for a perfect pair I was prepared to settle for perfectly functioning, after this injury and that. This morning it felt as if I might finally have got them back - not a perfect pair by Olympic standards, but good enough to do the distance.

So I was out on my test run, when I suddenly found myself swerving to avoid a pair of swans sitting together on the path. I turned back to look at them after I'd passed, hoping their bills would touch and they would form a heart shape with their necks (because that sort of metaphor pleases me). They didn't oblige, but all the same they looked the perfect pair: utterly intransigent, together, peaceful, while the world and its runners revolved around them.

The sight of them caused me to wonder how nature is deliberately designed to the power of two. The powerful grace of the swan, the gentle romance of the turtle dove, the patient, enduring penguin - all steadfast pairs. And yet, apparently, so are the wolf and the vulture. Not exactly cuddly by reputation, but as it turns out, reliable in the field of lasting relationships.

After lunch, K and I were caught in the act of having a cheeky snog in the kitchen by the Impster. 'You two are a good combo,' she said.

'Thanks,' we said, taken off guard by her surprising 5-year-old mode of expression. And then she nestled in between us and that was that. Another reminder that these days it's not about quality time, but seconds grabbed; not about grand displays, but tiny signs - the two empty wine glasses from the night before always waiting to be washed up; his two lips that speak our domestic shorthand.

This evening we watched our two children playing in the bath together, larking and laughing together with outrageous confidence. We shared a joke and all at once he kissed me again.

And into my head sprang Ira Gershwin's words: 'who could ask for anything more? Who could ask for anything more?'

Fortuna

I stood at the bottom of the steps leading up St Catherine's Hill. I'd just run up and walked down and now I was contemplating running up again. There are 330 steps and they get steeper the higher you go. Of course I wasn't fit enough to run them again. Then I remembered I wasn't fit enough the first time. It isn't your legs and your lungs that get you up there - it's your mind.

So tonight I ran. I ran to feel my heart beat, to feel my blood race, to breathe. I ran too far, too fast. Fast enough, perhaps, to even lose my mind. For that moment in time I was my own limiting factor. It felt like pure, unstoppable escapism.

Tomorrow I will ache, tomorrow my persistent cough will worsen. Tomorrow I will remember the previous damage - the black knee, the bruised foot - and will regret it. Tomorrow I will be slow and I will think.

In all likelihood I will consider what happiness looks like to an average runner, an average lover, an average mother, an average employee, and how it might best be achieved.

On Saturday night a friend, who has recently had her first baby, told me it won't make sense for her to return to work. I used to work with her, so I know her talent and have watched her painstakingly build her career over the years. We talked it over, trying (and failing) to make sense of this surprising turn of events.

Perhaps this is why today I have been beset by that familiar feeling that what matters is not the taking part but the sense of winning. And that you have to be a loser before you can be a winner. Sometimes it seems as if we spend our lives wilfully knocking things down in order to build ourselves back up.

I got to the top of the steps. I took in the view. And I turned and walked down again.

What Christmas looks like

Thursday: a man is walking towards me as I run down a muddy track. He is dark and thick set and he looks like he wants to kill someone. Then around the bend appear four children walking with their mother. She looks like she wants to kill someone. Oh dear, I think, Christmas holidays.

Friday: my beautiful goddaughter is hanging a gingerbread family on our tree (a few limbs go missing). My children are playing a raucous game of 'touching the ceiling' with her father. Outside on the drive K's car is drawing up. He is home early and we are all excited. Oh good, I think, Christmas holidays.

Saturday: a little sequined angel is standing at the front of the church, holding hands with a littler shepherd clutching his toy lamb. The angel is singing Away in a Manger and is protecting the shepherd from stampeding wise men. A young couple steal a kiss as they leave the church. Oh good, I think, Christmas love.

Sunday: four wide eyes, sparkling with excitement as wrapping paper is ripped open and presents are shared. K is carving a five bird roast, symbol of generosity and greed. Oh dear, I think, for what we are about to receive I feel horribly guilty.

Monday: two people standing by a fire on their allotment, which gives me a warm cold feeling as I run past. The owner of a local wine bar walking his dog waves hello (and I resolve to drink less next year). More people walking in ever stranger familial formations. A waterlogged nature reserve, with up-tailed ducks searching for morsels. Two planes flying overhead, uniting and dividing a couple of hundred families. The world's coolest parents on rollerblades, teaching their youngest of three how to skate. Darkness descending as I reach home, but on the front lawn two bright white doves shine out. Oh good, I think, Christmas peace.

Running to keep it up

‘Frustrated?’ he says.

‘Always,’ I say.

‘Come on then, start a fight,’ he says. And I try to beat the sh*t out of him.

I have recently become a convert to boxing. It never fails to exhaust me, so it surely must burn some calories, and it never fails to satisfy either.

If I want to process things I like to walk. If I want to forget things, I run. I love running, because I love the comfort of its rhythm, but it doesn’t allow me to think - my head seems to work slower the faster that my legs move. If I want to vent, then boxing is the best therapy. If I’m bursting with happiness, then trampolining gives me an even greater high.

There was a moment after I’d had the children when I looked at myself naked in the mirror and wondered who was staring back. That’s not my body. Where have my boobs gone? Where has my waist gone? Bloody hell, where is my arse going? I knew I needed to get a grip before gravity did, so I started commando training at the Rugby Club under the tutelage of the rather wonderful Simon Weatherall. Without whom, I wouldn’t know a hook from an uppercut. Without whom, exercise would be something other people did.

As well as training the odd world championship boxer, and running GetFit121, Simon is on a one-man mission to give everyone a personal trainer, which is why he launched the free Oobafit website and app earlier this year. Not only does it give you a tailor-made exercise plan, but it will also give you a personal nutrition plan, and at a click Tesco will deliver everything you need for the week direct to your door.

This week’s blogging activity has proven extremely bad for my state of health. Firstly because I can only blog while eating chocolate. And secondly because half an hour spent blogging is half an hour not spent running.

Alas I find myself growing in direct proportion with this blog. So here, thankfully, endeth the last post of the week.