Like most good ideas, it just drifts in from somewhere mysterious, when you’re least expecting it. Some call it The Muse, some think it’s divine inspiration. Others might see it as an inner voice, permitted a rare chance to be heard, but whatever it is, these thoughts appear all of a sudden, and then they’re part of the rest of your life. And maybe a similar thing just happened with parkrun.
Friday evening, tired, with a busy weekend ahead. But the idea wafts in that a dose of fresh air in the morning would start Saturday well, and give you a chance to catch up with a friend. Before you have a chance to reconsider, your barcode arrives, and the whole process seems impossibly simple. So you clatter around in the wardrobe trying to find your running kit in the dark, and you head off to bed, amused by this sudden change of plan.
The sun comes up over the trees and this late September morning is a fine one for running. The air is crisp and clear, and you make your way towards Homewood, your local venue on a map covered in locations. There are coloured t-shirts displaying the number of runs completed all around as you warm up, which prove that parkrun - with its 9.00am Saturday morning routine - has become a fixture in people’s lives in the same way that the Sunday roast or golf lessons were in your own youth. Something that doesn’t move, in a world of flux. Something you can rely on.
There are all sorts of people here this morning - young and old, large and small - and it is as far from intimidating as you could get. One couple appear to be strapping their legs together in order to run as a tripod; another looks as if he’s stepped straight off the deck of Nelson’s Victory. There are dogs, who don’t bother warming up but look as if they could easily run until Thursday, and children, one of whom runs with his father at the same sort of pace as you do, and commentates energetically throughout while you and his forebear desperately conserve breath. It’s a mixed bunch, for sure, but there’s no trace of a frown anywhere.
A brief welcome is given, and then a Klaxon sounds, and you run off amidst this swarm of strangers. Halfway up the first, gentle hill, you realise you’re already out of breath, and that perhaps this won’t be the effortless jog you thought it was. You’ve always loved the idea of running, and done a fair amount of it, but as you try to replenish the cool forest air in your lungs, it occurs to you that you’ve only really loved the running itself a few times, and that far more often than not it’s hard work.
The route is a rugged trail, winding up and through some gorgeous woodland, and as you pass through the dappled light seeping between the branches, you feel grateful to be out in the wilderness again. The leaves of the many broadleaf species have started their migration from green to orange, and later they will turn brown and move towards the ground, marking the change in the seasons as they slowly fade.
On one tricky uphill section, the runners show their individual nature, their approach to life, in the way they tackle it. Some fly up in long strides, trusting the clay to hold firm under their strike, while others slow right down in this bottleneck, cautious and fearful. Three times you pass by this way, but the fellow runners are always patient, letting each other face this scramble in their own way, at their own pace.
This caring feeling comes back as you roll your ankle not once, but twice. You hobble out of the way while you test your weight on that sore outer ligament, and everyone who passes is full of concern, ready to stop and help if you need it. But you’re okay, and you carry on, and all the while this feeling builds of what a supportive, positive, inclusive community this is.
The running hurts most of us a little, but in this shared shuffle through the trees, we are all growing just a little bit, it seems. This little patch of paradise feels like a rare space in which to be kind to ourselves and each other, a safe space in which to gently test ourselves, and to support something good and right and simple, in a world of bewildering complexity.
We’re carving out a few minutes for ourselves here, but in doing so we share some vibe of exploration with the girls and boys all around us, and from 9.00am until we pass through the finish line, we arrest the steady march of time, the demands of the weekend, until parkrun is complete. Standing around gasping for breath are dozens of us, soaked in sweat, our calves splattered in mud, and it strikes me how vulnerable and beautiful we all are, though we’d pass each other without a glance or a thought in the supermarket or at the roundabout.
To stop still for a moment and look at what is right here in front of us, instead of hurtling down the next rabbit-hole of duty or worry, is precious, but it took a last minute decision to try parkrun to find this sacred space, and as you take your turn to slowly clap in the next batch of finishers, the steady cadence of W.H. Davies’ “Leisure” somehow occupies your mind, that last couplet still nudging us back to the world around us a century later:
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
We go our separate ways, and life resumes its sprint as we emerge from the bubble of parkrun, but for the rest of the day, some remnant of that morning’s gift remain. Your legs hurt a little, and by dusk you are exhausted, but you also have this persistent sense of achievement. The whole parkrun phenomenon is so easy to engage with, so simple to “buy”, so clear in its vision, but still you have to put yourself out there a little - choose to take part.
It’s so refreshing to find something that is so well organised, and the voluntary help of the marshals, and this unified and welcoming spirit of the congregation make it all run so smoothly. In theory, we could all just head to a park and run, but somehow this thing - parkrun - is more than the sum of those parts. It seemed unlikely that it could be so valuable until you saw what goes on here, and having glimpsed this efficiency, and the positivity it breeds, you spend much of the rest of the week looking for equivalents, and find little that really compares.
Parkrun costs nothing. It involves no pressure; no hassle. It begins every Saturday at 9am and carries on as a state of mind until you either stop moving, or stop marveling at it (which hasn’t happened yet!). It is, in the typically uncluttered language of this wonderful enterprise, “Free for Everyone Forever”. Why can’t there be more things like this in life?
Thank you for reading this latest Stymie. Normal service (nostalgic, self-indulgent golf writing) will resume shortly! Please subscribe and share this with a friend if you like it…and have a look for your local parkrun!!!
Reliably the best part of my week. Welcoming and wonderful every time 🏃🏼♀️