From the top of some part of the world: Children of the Corn

I stepped out of my house this morning for my run, turned the corner, and walked into a cold, windy world of misery. Adjusting my ipod and walking past the abandoned house formerly occupied by a creepy old man, a giant gust of wind blew my headphones out of my ears. "Fucking hell!" I exclaimed, while fumbling to retrieve them.

I heard a strange rustling to my right, and turned to look towards the overgrown cornfield. Brown corn stalks leaned precariously at all angles, supported only by a company of dead vines and weeds. From the earth itself rose a small hump, slowly morphing into a wrinkled obaachan. She came silently out of the cornfield to stand expressionless, judging me.

"Samui desu ne." I greeted this apparition, turned on my ipod and ran away.

In Japan, it's typical to make repetitive complaints about the weather over and over again for an entire season. It gets to the point where you want to physically hurt someone if they exclaim how hot or cold it is one more time. I promise to spare you from that ear pain by getting it all out of my system right now.

I hate cold. I hate the dark and cold. I hate running in the dark and cold. I really hate running in the dark, cold and wind. Obviously, rain/snow plus dark, cold and wind is a scenario too gruesome to be imagined.

During the week, I run in the evenings because it's slightly warmer than the mornings and I suck at getting up early. Our village has very few street lights and an abundance of wildlife. Most evenings, you can find me running in the pitch black with a bear bell jingling on my bum, my only light the weak beam coming from my head lamp. Occasionally, I catch a glimpse of shiny yellow eyes in the bushes, and if I'm lucky, unidentified black shapes dart across the road in front of me. I pray the bears are too busy getting ready to hibernate to bother me.

The other evening I made the mistake of trying to do speed intervals in the park next to the river. As the air cooled on the river, mist rose off in waves, and combined with the bouncing beam of my headlight, I felt like I was running in a club with a strobe light and fog machine. It was making me a bit ill.

When I return home to my warm, lit house I find my tights have been attacked by various burrs of all shapes and sizes. I've become the Johnny Appleseed of weeds, carrying their seeds on my legs and distributing them throughout the land.

I strip off my tights, long sleeved shirt, fleece and gloves. It's only about 10 degrees C outside, and I'm not even hot. Come January, I will most likely be running in full ski gear.

This will be me! Photo credit: Nagoya Women's Marathon

And why am I running? Because I have an early March marathon. And because without consistent cardio, I gained over 15 lbs in the last 2 years that I've only just this year gotten rid of. But mostly, it's the race. You get a Tiffany necklace! I know I could just go out and BUY a Tiffany necklace as after you add in the marathon fee, hotel, and train tickets, it might have worked out cheaper, but that just seems so much more extravagant. It seems way more logical to run a marathon for it, don't you think? And then there's that June 100k I'm contemplating....

But back to the cold. Someday I will live in a place that is warm. All the time. Preferably a small tropical island tucked quietly away somewhere. But with my track record in tropical places, I will probably inflict a 1 woman climate change...