This Wuss Can

Every now and again you hear a shocking story about someone who has been attacked while out running.  Rare though those events are, the fear amongst runners is understandably high.  As someone who likes to run stretches of quiet trail on my own, I often wonder if I’m being foolish.  But I remind myself that this running lark is doing me the world of good and I love it too much to have the experience ruined by worries about encountering a random nutter.

Some days, however, my already colourful imagination goes into overdrive and I become convinced that today is the day I will be murdered.  I can be trotting along quite happily and then suddenly I’ll spot someone in the distance and I'll decide quite spontaneously and no doubt erroneously that something isn't quite right about that person.  Before I know it, I’ll have persuaded myself that I'm in danger.  The other day, I became particularly nervous.  I kept turning my head, was certain I could hear frantic footsteps up close behind me.  Each time I turned, there was nothing.  It continued for a while.  It eventually dawned on me that I had a plastic bag folded up inside the pocket of my running jacket and it was moving around as a I ran.  (My plan had been to pop into Tesco after the run and pick up a few groceries.)  I had no idea just how much noise a plastic bag could make when you run with one on your person. The rustling really did sound like aggressive, demented serial-killer feet pounding along the gravel path to get me.

My nerves weren’t exactly calmed when a friend of mine told me of a strange and unsettling dream he’d had which featured me.  In this dream I was about to do a race and he was warning me about a maniac who was going around hitting runners’ legs and feet with a spade.  Sure enough, this man appeared and set about bludgeoning the shins of all the poor runners.  Luckily, I managed to escape because my friend had warned me in time.  The worrying thing in today’s world is that I can actually imagine something as weird as this happening for real. 

It’s not just serial killers and spade-wielding maniacs you have to worry about, of course.  When my imagination goes a bit crazy, I also worry about attacks from animals.  Dogs are the obvious ones, but thankfully the owners where I live are on the whole pretty responsible and keep their dogs under control.  Most call their dogs to them so that I can pass by without the dog chasing after me.  Just occasionally though I’ll encounter a dog that seems to be owner-less and although I like dogs, that’s when I panic. Growing up in the 1970s when wandering dogs were as common as the white poop that littered the streets, I seemed to get followed home by a stray dog at least once a week.  I was never attacked, but I can’t say I found it a particularly relaxing experience either. I guess these memories stay with you.

One of the problems with being over 50 is that your eyesight can start to let you down in quite spectacular ways.  Combine this with an over-active imagination and a sense for drama and you’re likely to have a less than straightforward run.  One day I saw a fox.  This startled me somewhat.  I’ve no idea whether a fox would randomly attack a human, especially a benign-looking, middle aged jogger.  With my rational head on, I suspect it probably would not.  But foxes don’t get the best press and it doesn’t take much to unnerve me.  Feeling brave and a little curious (I’ve never seen a fox up close before) I carried on, albeit more tentatively than usual.  As I got a bit closer though I realised that there was no fox at all, just a run-of-the-mill ginger cat.  Needless to say I felt a mixture of relief and disappointment.

My failing eyes struck again a few weeks later with similar consequences.  This time I saw what I assumed was a sculpture of a sheep ahead of me.  (To be fair, the Trans Pennine Trail does have a few interesting animal carvings dotted along the route, so a wooden sheep certainly wouldn’t have been out of place.)  When the ‘sculpture’ finally moved its head after what seemed an eerily long time, I realised it was in fact a real live sheep (unless I was witnessing a sort of Jason and the Argonauts moment of a statue coming to life, I suppose.)  Now, sheep are not exactly associated with violent attacks and it’s a little embarrassing to look back on now, but in a split second I made my decision to do an about turn and sprint for dear life, cutting short what should have been a long, very scenic and pleasant run. 

And don't even get me started on a field of cattle.  I know in most cases the cows are just going to stare at you and keep chewing the cud and it's not exactly the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, but it's not something I want to risk, thank you. 

So, despite my collection of inspiring fridge magnets declaring things like “This Girl Can” and “She believed she could, so she did” I suppose I'm actually a bit of a wuss.  (But I guess that's probably okay because somewhere on the internet, I'm bound to find an empowering mantra about owning your wussiness.)  Anyway, it's not as if I let sheep dictate my running route on a regular basis or let an (admittedly sizeable) ginger cat scupper my pace. I like to think I have my moments of badassery.

It might be time to start finding out about sports glasses though.  I'm not the only one.  I remember a lady in my online running group telling a great story of how she'd been running along the Thames Path for the last few summers and always shouted good morning to this man sitting peacefully in his riverside garden.  It took her ages to realise his peaceful state was in fact due to him being made of plastic.  Running - there's never a dull moment.