Sometimes you have to sweat to feel o.k..
I ran to Cupar over fields and tracks
And on some bits of tarmac road today
Through grass and nettles, puddles, holes and cracks
Along through woods and over barbed-wire stiles,
Past grazing cattle, horses in a hige field
Sheltered from too much sunshine; and for miles
Hardly a sound except the gusting wind
Which kept me cool. Sometimes I'd yield
To the desire to stop and look around
Like W.H.Davies on his unhurried travels.
Although I stood, I didn't stare but looked,
Sweeping the wide horizon to the hills,
east and West Lomond, and up close, Drumcarro
Craig. Some people have vacations booked
In Mediterrannean places - Crete, Corfu or Naples -
Where oil-smooth sunburned flesh sweats in the narrow
Streets with high houses, laundry hanging out,
Cars hooting, cafe tables full, waiters touting
For customers. That's fine, but what about
This place for holidays? I like to go abroad
But find myself here just as close to God
Or whatever made this landscape what it is.
I feel a part of it, and I suppose it's his.
Weather for vest and shorts: I had a Fife
Athletic Club vest and blue, torn baggy shorts,
Worn Nike trainers which my former wife
Brought back from Florida a year ago.
I started slowly, for of all the sports
That I know, running doesn't need
A lot of special pre-game preparation,
You just get out there and 'pit doon yer heid'
As Terry Mitchell, my close running buddy
Might say. I took the Kinnessburn
Path to the Largo Road, where once a cuddy
Stood to be photographed pulling its cart.
Up, and along the Braes, over the hidden lade
And over Cockshaugh, where the Council made
A park from fields as part of the campaign
To make Great Britain's children fit again
Under the Thirties' reign of the fifth George
(A prize for rhymes for 'Fifth' - some sucre d'orge
Or Mars Bars, also a Thirties survival,
Or else Fry's Chocolate Cream - it's having a revival).
A council tractor had chosen a wet day
To drive across the park where children play
And leave great ruts of mud and pushed up grass
So that they slide and skid each time they pass
As I did. Then I ran along the burn
Glancing up at the top path at every twist and turn
Or at the burn, quite full but not in spate.
I took my time at every cycle gate
Lest I should trip, as I once did before
In Edinburgh, and landed on the floor
During a relay, injuring my knee
Before the London to Brighton in 1963.
(Here of course I could make a diversion
And comment on the Griffiths-Jones aversion
To English wives and servants drinking tea
And leafing through a Lady Chatterley,
Or I could mention Larkin's witty comment
On what he took to be affairs of moment
Concerning the Beatles, sex and things like that -
I'd better not - he knew more what was what.)
Meantime my body has gone on ahead
To Carron Place, and stopped to pass some stuff,
Poems and such, to a local journalist
And told him some Liberal gossip, just enough
For him to start a hare off in the mist
Of Scottish parliamentary politics
Though I don't know if I really care enough
About these 'issues'. I don't like the tricks
That parties have to pick their candidates,
Standing for hours at bloody polling gates,
Canvassing people who want to have their tea,
Standing there saying (I hate it): Vote for me!
Through the new houses on the small estate
That Ian Lang consented to: its gate
Is artificial, trying to make us think
That some aristocrat sozzled on drink
Had caused it to be built. Up the next hill
To Craigtoun Park: the golf course still
Has lots of water on it, fewer people,
Although it's a nice day. I look back at the steeple
Of Holy Trinity, about three miles back
And head past the home farm to attack
The steepest part, which ends just by the fence
Which used to be quite low, and we would climb
over it just to save a bit of time
Before they put it up to six foot three
And oh! how great the difference to me!
Literary echoes there, I don't know whose -
Wordsworth, says someone. I hope we never lose
Craigtoun to companies who will develop
The ponds and grassy meadows that envelop
The hilltop, though of course it was quite daft
To change the entrance, swapping fore for aft,
Building a shelter that isn't used at all
Except by lovers at the KK Ball.
I skirted Craigtoun Park, and headed south
Across the golf course, wiping face and mouth
With my vest's tucked-in bit. There is a ditch
And then a barbed-wire fence - God, what a bitch! -
To cross before I penetrate the horse
Field (as we call it) past a patch of gorse
And over yet another gate to land
In mud and nettles, on which I sting my hand,
And slow down to a walk. The grass is high,
The nettles keep on stinging, leg and thigh
Will still be throbbing when I get back home.
Running again - the rhythm now quite slow
Because it's still uphill. I want to go
By Denhead crossroad and behind the hill
Past Lohoar's farm (I remember still
Hamish at school in 1965
When I was young (and only half alive)).
Then comes a long straight - a man cutting grass
Stops to watch the strange sight of a runner pass.
A couple, getting on a bit, quite fat:
One of them says: 'I wish I could do that'
And I shout back at her: 'You can, you can'.
She doesn't believe me, just smiles at her man.
A twisty bit downhill, then comes the main
Road to Pitscottie, another mile, and then
Just after Bruce's house I head off right,
The easily flooded settlement in sight
Where Roly Jack, the local councillor, had
To get the council to send good money after bad
To shore things up; but it seems all right now,
Though I'd rather have seen it under plough
Instead of yet more houses, but I suppose
That people want to live there. If they don't
It could be that the local shops will close
Or garages, so that they'll have to drive
To Cupar or St Andrews to keep themselves alive.
Up the last real hill, and round the bend
(In more than one sense); but I just pretend
It's some big race. I've just three miles to go
And I can't lose even by going slow
If I just keep my head down and concentrate
On getting there. Ian Elliott left it late
In the Cupar '11' some years past:
He'd stopped to nurse a calf near Dairsie Brig
And Terry and I went past him, pretty sure
That that was that. But what's slow can get fast,
And Ian overtook us on the brae
Above Rumgally, and ran right away.
Terry and I could try our best, could zig-
Zag across corners trying to catch him up
But had to be content with second and third
While Ian went home clutching the silver cup.
Back to this run: half past one's not too late;
I can get back for lunch - banana jam
Which I'm trying out, some buttered bread and ham,
And a long drink of cranberry and pear
Juice that I got at Safeway, which is where
I do most of my shopping. If I need
Something more quickly - there's B&B to feed -
I go to Tesco Metro in Market Street
Where there's a biggish choice of things to eat.
Thinking of this I pound on down the hill.
Thundering vans and cars and lorries fill
The road on both sides. It's hardly a motorway
But pretty busy for the time of day.
Thank God! The railway bridge comes into sight
That had to be repaired. For many a night
We had to drive home (or run) from Council functions
Like Planning, Housing (there were no free luncheons)
By the A91, not quite so scenic
Or by St Michael's Drive - not photogenic
Exactly, but ordinary houses in straight rows
Like millions of other British bungalows.
In fact at night it sometimes gets so dark
In the country, without a moon. I sometimes used to park
Myself without knowing it on the verge
Of the Strathkinness High Road, had to swerve
Like some drunk cyclist over half the road
Trying to follow the tenets of the Highway Code.
And when a solitary light shone at a door
Or a car dazzled me from miles away
I almost had to stop, and looking more
In to the verge as up to, past me tore
Some businessman with BMW
Or Ford Granada streaking thataway.
But that's going backwards - I am nearly there;
My toe is sore, because my feet are bare
Inside my shoes - I left my socks at home
Thinking I wouldn't need them as I roam
The hinterland - the shoes are well run in. You see
How easily mistakes are made - yes, even me
With more than forty years experience
Stills tries to run like Tunisians or Algerians,
Although you'd think I'd know my limitations
I still feel blisters (though not palpitations
Which in the 1980s made me stop
Trying to keep up with runners at the top
And brought my training down a peg
Or two, until my Edin to Glasgow relay leg
Was moved from 2 or 4 or 6
(The hardest ones) to the stages in the sticks
Where all the hacks competed to be best -
Maybe nineteenth if you stuck out your chest
Crossing the line.But it would take a book
To talk about that relay. Tension shook
Many a favourite from the winner's perch
And teams tried for long autumn months to search
For some ingredient - new recruits, new training,
putting clips on your nose when it was raining
Or even when it wasn't - no one ever went broke
Selling 'the secret' to athletic folk.
The final corner - up over the railway bridge
Just by the station. Up there on the ridge
Stands a stone statue - I forget the name -
Seeming to say : You got there just the same.
What does he mean ? I think he's trying to say
That if you keep on working every day
Whether in sport or writing, ordinary jobs
Whether with modest people or with snobs,
Just keep your head down - no need to be vain.
Nothing so special about ten miles in the rain
Or thirteen in the sunshine like just now -
You've done something worth doing, something good
Whether to please yourself or a multitude.
I strip my vest off, dry myself on a rug
Lying in the boot, intended to keep snug
Picnickers - but the last time it was used
St Peter in his weather role refused
To let the sun shine; behind Arthur's Seat
we had to smile, ignore the rain, and eat
Bananas, cakes, Mars Bars and drink juice -
Hardly the day on which to play fast and loose
With anyone on rugs or in the whins -
Not that I tried to commit any sin
On that occasion: just a friendly outing
Rather like the editorial board of 'Scouting'
As I imagine them, with shorts and woggles
And duffle-coats with nasty leather toggles.
I hope they realise that I'm just joking -
It's at myself, not them, that I am poking
Fun - if you'd seen us, huddled close together
Pretending that we were enjoying the weather...
Get on with it: I've got my second vest
That I'd carried round some papers in (what a pest)
For eighty-seven minutes (without stops)
And it's still dry: the smelly wet vest drops
Into the boot. I close it and head in
To Reekie's reception area, looking thin
And rather sun-tanned, reddish in the face
as if I'd just competed in a race.
Or that's what one chap said - the boss of sales
Who sold us our Corsa. Every deal entails
Coming and going, haggling over price -
He's like the rest of them - but he's quite nice,
Knocks off a bit, says that his profit's gone,
Lays it on thick enough to spread a scone -
That's how it works. But I quite like the car
And now that it can travel - not twice as far
But sixty miles more for every filled-up tank
(For that I have my Ecoflow to thank)
I hope to keep it for a year or two -
Why spend so much money on a spanking new
Car that loses so much value as it leaves
The showroom. Wasting so much money grieves
My 'grown up in the Forties' soul - the costs are bad enough:
Replacing a wing-mirror that some would-be tough
St Andrews kids had strong-armed to submission -
I'd kick their arses if I had permission
And give them ten years hard without remission,
Or, on the longer scale, send to perdition
People who vandalise, take out their spite
On parents or school in the middle of the night.
Changing the filters, sparking plugs, the oil -
All detailed on a flimsy counterfoil.
A hundred and eighty quid - my card can pay it.
I shut my mouth and let the computer say it.
At least I've got the car, and can head off
Homwards, where there's a loaf of new bread to scoff.
During the run ideas came by the dozen
For poems and articles, things that have chosen
To come into my head and make their presence known,
Some just a snatch of verse, others full-blown.
Let's hope that I can dredge them all once more
Up from my memory and that the store
Of projects will expand till I'm over eighty
Or even older: then you'll see the weighty
Tomes fill bookcases till there's no more space:
My own small offering to the human race.
