It is half past five, I have one trainer on and one in my hand, and it is already dark outside. Not dusky. Proper dark, the kind where the streetlights have that orange fuzz around them and the neighbour’s car looks like a shape rather than a car.
The clocks go back this weekend, which means this is about to be every evening until about March. So I thought I would write down how I actually get through it, partly for anyone else staring at the door right now, and partly for me, because I will need reminding by about the second week of November.
It has also been a while since I posted anything. The summer happened, the kids went back to school, and the blog sat here quietly while I got on with things. Hello again 🙂
The first dark run is the worst one
Last winter the first run after the clocks changed felt like a completely different sport. Same legs, same route, but everything seemed further away and every noise in a hedge was obviously something terrible.
It was not, of course. It was a cat. It is always a cat.
By the third or fourth evening it just felt like running again, only a bit colder. I think the worry is mostly that it is new, and new things feel bigger than they are. I said nearly the same about the rain once I finally stopped letting British weather stop me, and it turns out the dark works the same way.
The riverside loop is off for the winter
My favourite route goes along the river, and I love it, but there are long bits with no lights at all. In daylight it is lovely. In the dark I genuinely cannot see where the path ends and the mud begins, and Toby can see perfectly well and does not care.
So from now until spring I stick to the roads near the house where the streetlights are. It is more boring. There are more bins. But I can see my feet, and I can see the kerbs, and I am not spending the whole run worrying about my ankles. My shorter loop that comes back past the front door gets a lot of use in the winter too.
The one thing I do every single time is tell whoever is home which way I am going and roughly when I will be back. It takes ten seconds and it means I can stop thinking about it.
Being seen, which is not the same as seeing
This was the bit I got wrong at first. I thought running in the dark was about me being able to see. Actually most of it is about cars and bikes being able to see me, and in a navy jacket on a wet road, they really cannot.
I am not going to pretend I bought anything fancy, because budget is still very much a thing in this house. A cheap light that clips on, something bright or reflective on top, and a little flashing light on Toby’s collar so he is not just a dark blob trotting along next to me. That was it. He looks like a very small, very proud emergency vehicle.
One thing I have learned the hard way: if the light is on your head, point it down at the pavement. A torch straight in someone’s eyes on a dark road is horrible, and I have been on both ends of that now.
The real problem is the sofa
Honestly, the dark is not what stops me most evenings. It is that by half five I have done the school run, a day of everything, and tea is half on, and the sofa is right there being warm.
What helps is not thinking about it. Trainers by the door in the morning, kit on as soon as I get in, out before I have properly sat down. Once I have sat down, it is over, and I know that about myself by now.
Some evenings I still do not go. If I am properly shattered, or it is pouring and pitch black and blowing a gale, I let it go and try to get out at the weekend in daylight instead. Missing a run is fine. Missing every run until April is the thing I am trying not to do.
Small and dark is still a run
None of these winter runs are going to be my best ones. They are short, they are under streetlights, and quite a lot of them are me and a flashing dog going round the same few roads. But they count, and in March when it is light again I will be very glad I did not start from scratch.
So that is the plan. Lights on, stay where it is lit, tell someone, and get out the door before the sofa wins. Toby has already decided he is in.
Pat x