Letters to No One

Here I am, back from a three-and-a-half-hour run. Sat at a desk; getting on with work.

I’m tired. Not from the running, I’m just tired.

It’s midnight here, and I’m trying to get back on with some work before I fall asleep. It’s not going well. But then again, it hasn’t been going well for the last five days. I have a deadline on Thursday.

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.

Douglas Adams

I didn’t even mean to go for such a long run this evening. It’s just when I got back from my run, I’d missed the supermarket closing. So I decided to outrun the disappointment of not having a nice meal tonight. This might not be the best training approach, but it seems to be the one I am taking.

The US AQI Index during my run was 102. That’s unhealthy for sensitive groups. I’m not convinced the physical health benefits of running outweigh the traffic exhaust fumes. But running is still good for the soul. 

There’s something calming about running long distances. Run far enough and the mind quiets down and everything makes sense. Unfortunately, I’m not fit enough to run far enough to get my mind to shut up. Instead, I am sat here, trying to work out how to run the length of a country, train to run the length of a country and find some way of affording it, all on my own. Today it got a bit overwhelming.

It probably didn’t help that yesterday’s run was difficult. Yesterday my legs ached and I didn’t want to run. Today my legs still ached, but I ran twice, to make up for it. On top of that, the IT work I’m doing is taking far longer than it should. And I’m taking responsibility for that, I’m not passing the cost onto the client. I’ve probably worked for free for the last five days. I also need to figure out how to edit these videos efficiently and get more photos and things for social media. I need to find time to get proper food, stretch, rest, and recover. I woke up multiple times last night with stress dreams. (You know it’s a proper stress dream when your high-school teachers start showing up!) To add to my woes, each day I open my computer to find the number of jobs on my to-do list has gone up again. 

I thought about whether I should post this, but there’s a certain amount of freedom in writing a blog post that nobody even reads; of putting pen to paper and writing a letter to no one. 

One day, hopefully, I’ll have run the length of Japan. Perhaps after that, some other poor sod will be searching the web, learning how to do their own mad adventures. While I hope they come across this site and most of it inspires them to go out and explore the world, the site should also reflect the truth of the endeavour. The moments nobody sees are as important as the grand ones presented on social media. All great stories need their ups and their downs. 

So, while I am sitting here with a cup of tea to warm the dark night of the soul, I’ll embrace it and tomorrow I shall keep on running. 

I’ll get through this slump. This too shall pass. Things will work out; they usually do. Until then, I’ll keep on writing these letters to no one. 

Thank you for reading.