OLD SCHOOL FITNESS (Part 4)

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She would have gone even if only to take walk on her own. All day she would be with three small children. Ever since she first became pregnant she had never been alone. She was pregnant for six years. She had fed children for six more. Now she needed space. She needed to breathe.

We lived on the outskirts of Aberdeen city, in Scotland. To reach the solitude of the Scottish countryside, my mother merely had to run down to the end of the street, past all the neighbours. 1979 was not a time in which women would often be seen going for a run, and the novelty would raise comments.

She had picked her time well. The kids were now all at school and, considering the decade, she could be sure that at least half of the adults were at work. All that remained were her female friends and neighbours. She would suffer a short jog to the end of the street, and in moments she would enter the freedom of the surrounding farms, fields, trees and blue summer sky. The moment she reached the road’s end solitude and liberation embraced her.

She was free.

She only ran a couple of miles. From her first steps out onto the road the upcoming marathon became incidental. She wasn’t pushing, pulling, lifting chasing, carrying or feeding a child. This was twenty minutes of freedom before returning to her cherished…