For some reason while out on my run tonight I found myself to be hypersensitised, with every sight, smell, touch and sound amplified several times over. I am not sure if this is because of the combination of extreme cold and dark night (no moon) or because for the first time as I left for my run I uttered to Carleen the words I have been anticipating but dreading: "I can't really be bothered training tonight". Perhaps it was because my mind was able to wander as I was on a familiar route and I had nothing technical to concentrate on during the run. Regardless, I got into a rhythm really quickly and I was very soon bombarded with sensory stimuli.
The first thing I noticed was the smell of smoke that drifted aimlessly along the Leith Valley, emanating as it did from every chimney I passed. Some smelled like a comfortable campfire ablaze in a circle of tents while others had the tar-like stench of coal or the toxic fumes of smoldering chemicals. These aromas swirled around my head, filling my lungs with thick soup of nastiness. As I ambled down the valley I also noticed the sepia-toned glint of the frost on the footpath as it glimmered in the amber glow of the street lamps. My face, ears and neck were frozen to the point of hurting by the friged air that pressed down on me and the barley audible, yet constant, crunch of frost under foot reminded me of one of the reasons I was so reluctant to train tonight.
As I left the valley and passed the Woodhaugh Gardens the sounds of the city started to invade my personal space. I could hear the raucous, but rhythmic chants of a student party off to the left as they celebrated the end of the first day of semester. Then out of the darkness and to my great surprise I heard the faint cry of a native owl - a Morpork - over my right shoulder; only the second time I have ever heard one in Dunedin, the first time ironically walking home after a raucous student party.
Nearing George Street I was now fully immersed in the soft low rumble of the city. Cars would roll past, lights blazing and tyres humming on the road and crunching on the grit. Groups of students would walk past in the opposite direction, their voices seeming to penetrate deep inside me. Out through the campus and past the new stadium construction site the sights, sounds and smells of the city were a veritable cacophony. Then, as I neared the harbour, it was all replaced by the roar of a very gentle, but bitterly cold, polar breeze as it hit my face. Now my face ached and burned and I could concentrate on little else.
Two kilometres later, out of the wind in the lee of the hill, I began to notice several running partners join me. Some were ghostly grey others were reassuringly sold dark shapes. They would be right beside me as I passed under the street lamps, but would stretch out in front of me as I moved on, another joining me just as I reached the next light. I have never noticed my shadows before while running, but tonight they were great company.
As I turned to to head back up the harbour on the waterfront track the roar of the breeze on my face and in my ears was replaced with the hypnotic "clop-rasp-clop-rasp-clop rasp" of my feet pounding the pavement and my arms rubbing on the side of my nylon jacket. This beat was only broken by a single shrill from an Oystercatcher on the shore and the "phert - phert - phert" of my latest contribution to greenhouse gases as it reverberated in time with my stride. The harbour was dark but my eyes were drawn to the asynchronous blinking of the green and red channel markers and the occasional white seabird flying into the outer reaches of the glow of the street lamps.
Back at Logan Park again and the oppressive weight of the cold hit me; my face burning and arms and shoulders starting to feel like lead. Off in the distance I could hear a large group of very loud students, then from the corner of my eye I saw something scuttle across the grass beside me. I jump back in surprise and heard claws scurry up the bark of a tree and saw a very large possum scoot up the trunk faster than I could run away. As I neared the noisy students I saw that the large group was actually only seven or eight very drunk, and far too under-dressed, women. Their antics were unbearably loud and, when one of them tried to mock me by running behind me in her high heels, the sound of her shoes pierced my ear drums. Their laughter surrounded me like we were all locked in a small cupboard and I moved on as fast as I could.
By the time I start heading back up the Leith Valley with a hint of stale beer in the air, my right hip is getting very tired and my "clop-rasp" was replaced with a "clop-rasp-skid/clop-rasp-clop-rasp-skid/clop-rasp" as my right leg drags ever so slightly across the grit on the footpath. I was occasionally rejoined by my running partners as I pass under the widely spaced street lamps and the Waters of the Leith babbled alongside me as the river meandered down the valley.
Back at the truck and done for the night, I had covered 14.9km in 1:27 without even thinking about it. I am refreshed by the run but completely drained by the over-stimulation.
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