Running Errands
The challenges of small town schedules
I’ve been trying to pick up some dry cleaning for nearly a week. My schedule is not the issue here, although I do fantasise about how my forthcoming freelance life is going to liberate my options. Businesses in Corsham are just not open for the working individual. Some shops close as early as 2pm, nothing is open on a Sunday, only a few things are open on a Monday and very little opens until 9am. I am in the land of the retired, the work from home, the freelance, the flexible. The exact relaxed atmosphere that first enchanted me here comes at a cost.
I’ve become obsessed with potential opportunities to pick up my dry cleaning. Their closing times differ every day (seemingly apropos of nothing), adding to the gamification of the challenge. It’s nothing urgent at all; it’s my winter coat and some blouses, but it’s the sheer principal.
On Tuesday I finish up my most urgent tasks at work and check the clock: it’s 3:10pm. If I left now, I’d be cutting it fine to run and get there in time, but the temptation of the possibility tickles me. I get changed, lock the office door and get out.
Oh, I am so unfit. It’s been months of recovery from the mountains and then illness. I’m not too bothered about it most of the time, and every run is cash in the bank towards my comeback to form, but it rankles a little that ordinarily I could knock this route out in under 35 minutes and call it a tempo run. As it is, I am caning it to make it in 40 minutes. I don’t want to go any faster, so what will be will be.
And with that, halfway through the run, it’s no longer about dry cleaning at all. When my body and my mind tires, I take a breath and feel like I get a rush from oxygenated blood and muscles. I stay upright, I stay elastic, I keep my rhythm. My breathing stays even, I keep my shoulders relaxed. I feel the rush of energy that I was missing in all the time that I was unwell. For weeks, the fatigue would claw, carve and pull until I had to yield, stop and walk. But I remember this feeling. I love this feeling. I am able to hold strong, even when things are tough, and have no doubt that I’ll continue to be able to do so for the rest of the run.
For so long, I have not been able to hold strong.
I do make it in time. I’m there with 5 minutes to spare, my receipt and ticket at the ready. But the lights are out and the closed sign is turned. I check the opening hours on the door again: 4pm. For God’s sake, Corsham. I’m irritated and tired and annoyed. I stomp home, wondering when on earth I will next get a chance. But as I sit down and resume work from home, I remember striding out along those roads between Chippenham and Corsham, breathing and swinging my arms as I have so very many times before. Not only has the fatigue gone, but the fear of it has, too.
I’ll get my winter coat eventually. I’m just glad to be running.
(And reader, fear not, you can always rely on Corsham pubs to be open.)
