Wednesday

After my workout (shoulder and back) I took my protein shake and went and sat on the beach.

After working out I always feel serene and somewhat detached from the world but today, under the hot Israeli sun, I felt a deep sense of calmness. It was a moment tinged, also, with sadness, as it was on this beach that I received the call from my mum that my dad was very ill and I needed to get home immediately. I thought back to those days; days when everything seemed to unravel and when my only outlet was running. I thought about the my first gentle jogs around the village where my parents lived, the way I ran myself into the ground on my birthday, my first 10km and all the things that will lead me to Siberia. In my own view of the world it seems almost poetic that something that begun on a beach under a scorching sun should come to completion on a frozen lake in Russia. I sat on the beach until the sun set and soft music begun to drift from the many bars along the sea-front and for the first time in ages I didn’t think about my next workout or how far I had to run this weekend. It was, just for a few moments, perfect.

-Philip