Black dog days

I’m just back from a business sojourn in Amsterdam so it was that on Wednesday I found myself in a bookshop at Schipol looking for some material to occupy the hours before my flight. I saw a hardback copy of Haruki Murakami’s “What I Think About When I Think About Running”. My first impulse was to buy it but then I had doubts. Have you ever done this: anticipated something so much that you are afraid to buy it in case it lets you down? It was 17 euros – not a lot of money if it brings enjoyment but more than enough to rub salt into the wounds of shattered expectations. I held it in my hands and furiously debated with myself whether to buy. In the end I didn’t and I felt curiously depressed as if I had failed a test. A symptom, I suspect, of a greater malady.

Sunday’s half marathon seems a long time ago. I haven’t run since then which has torn up my training schedule. After the high of competition has come the antidote of the working routine. Tomorrow I have to motivate myself to pick up the pieces and clock some miles on the road. My training schedule requires me to run six days out of seven. Since February I have never let more than two consecutive days pass without a run so this hiatus has assumed a massive significance in my mind. In fact, I don’t feel like a runner anymore. Black dog days indeed.