I am being sensible. I really am. Three weeks on from my fall… the incident of the broken ribs... I could not contain myself any longer. My cross trainer is brilliant... I am so glad I have it. I have used it daily to keep myself and this old body going. In conjunction with daily Grammy duty and a brisk walk down to said small one every morning… I am healing and feeling good. But…I miss my fields 
So….Sunday morning…. A dry cold one, I decided to head out onto my beloved tracks and trails and have a walk! Yes… a walk… I have taken advice, and l know that really I should not be running just yet. But…a walk…to see what has happened over three weeks, how the season has moved on and what if anything has changed…I planned this, the night before... weather permitting and I slept well, despite soreness in ribs… the thought of getting outside again.. soothed my soul.
The regulation cup of tea and two biscuits...my gear was laid out the night before including my buff, Ullyrunner … I am wearing my running gear… plus extra thermal vest, as I will be walking not running. I headed out just about 8 a.m., so, a tad late for me… but I am crocked.
The day was calm. Cold with a bite of nippiness in the air… quiet and still as I headed out of the Close and down the hill to the village. Not a soul in sight; the houses, and their Sunday sleepers, curtained and cosy. The gardens bereft of any remaining bedding plants, shrubbed and berried and dressed in the hues of late autumn and winter. Winter pansies, Cotoneaster, Berberis, Pyracantha, decking the walls with red and yellow, and everywhere, the glossy sheen of holly.
The sky above, grey with the merest hint of warmth; a glimpse of sunlight behind scrappy, slate clouds. I was still walking, but briskly. I had forgotten how chilly it can be when we walk… down to the main road, devoid of traffic and people. Across the line and up past Rookery Wood, I smiled to think that in October last year I was running slower than I was walking now. The nests were silent, and the Horse Chestnuts, almost leafless, their leaves, discarded and crunchy, red and brown litter, beneath my feet.
Level with the sea-side shingle track to the field now and my heart was thumping in my chest. How silly to get so excited about a walk… but as I headed down to the field track and saw my majestic oak, completely without leaf, the mighty branched arms stretching into a winter sky… I thought I might cry. Silly old thing… I had a fall… I am still here, I can walk and exercise and I am going to get back to where I was before. I walked, sensibly along the hedges and through the fields, round and about, past the hidden pond and the Buttercup field; the track was grassy, the earth, softish, no mud, no hidden branches or holes or furrows… so, maybe a very gentle jog.
A jog so gentle that it could not even be called, an Irishprincess jogette; a jog that was the slowest and the softest jog, in the whole kingdom of Jogonia. Just about thirty or forty seconds, and then a walk, then another thirty or forty seconds, barely lifting my feet, rolling my foot, rather than lifting and so slowly…no impact at all really. No twinges and no sudden pain; just a few repeats and then back to a walk. It was so good. The feeling of moving… out and across the earth, the scents, the sounds of the morning, the crisp, clean scent of the cold hedgerows and the haws and hips casually decorating each dark corner of the fields. Bliss. I do not think I did myself any real harm.
The steam train line, unkempt and dowdy, and my foot-stile and track leading through a winter crop of green… through and up towards the steam railway… smoke and noise, all across the top of the field and the sharp-throat catching smell of the engines in steam. Early risers, preparing the sleeping dragons, the Santa Expresses must be starting! I headed along the copse of, not so new now, trees, russet and gold lining my path and squeezed by the big heavy gate onto the lane. I stopped to take a photograph of the dragon, and then very slowly walked down towards the village, and homeward. No gentle jog, the lane is too hard and I had done just enough for the time being. A walk, (plus tiny jogging steps) of about 5K, which took me a while, but was quite simply, pure delight.
On the way…the snail has left a small trail…
It's been said there's a book in all of us, and that's most definitely true in your case (and Flossie's), I'm sure of it.
Yeah, that doesn't surprise me.
