Clenched teeth

When I’m going through a bad patch in a run, I tend to clench my teeth, rolling my lips up and baring them like a snarling dog. At this point, usually running uphill, I’m not thinking about the effect of my grimace on passing strangers, I’m only thinking about how many breaths it will take before I can get to the top. However after the painful bit has passed, maybe sometime the next day, I remember the faces of people looking at me in horror.

“Why would someone do that to themselves?”, they must be thinking, “What is she doing? It’s 6.54am! I know I’m outside but I have to walk my dog/ get to work/ steal this car”. I think to myself that they must be jealous, they must wish they had my motivation, they wish they could run all the way up this hill without stopping. They’re not. What they’re really thinking is, “thank god that’s not me!”.

This morning I ran 5.5 miles, in the rain. I grimaced twice, once for 3 miles and once for 2 miles, as my dad would say… It wasn’t the best.