Story of two runs with my life partner :30th August and 6 th September Sunday runs with Sheila ( and off the track shailesh’s typical bakwas )
This is a general blog and does not follow any format or flow. It is kind of glimpses of running with Sheila and random thoughts.
You may consider this with the concept of “ fad in “ …..” fad outs “ shown in the movies.
( I had seen the hindi movie Parinda ( director vidhu chopra ) for second time in UP small town during one of the tour . The director has used fad in and fad outs liberally in the movie to give the dramatic effect. The small town cinema hall had a very old baba adamka projector system . with every fad outs it used to look ….bijli gayee….full darkness and the whole crowd used to scream. Also all the night shots very virtually in dark , not much was visible except one could hear dialogues and/or sound.
A good film was killed that night. I hope my fad in fad out some how works here. )
Fad in…………….
Pune University campus : its lush green . there are good asphalt roads. It is one of the favorite place for pune runners. But it is suitable for lesser mileage , that also if you are ready to do loops.
Running as you pass by different departments / buildings : more main stream like physics, chemistry to extra mural studies to department of pali language. Stone buildings with lanes and bye lanes.
The huge central building access is partially blocked as some restoration work is going on .
One can run till khadkee( kirkee ) gate end come back . similarly one can run to different exits and come back.
Our entry is from ganeshkhind side and once you enter you can see no of cars and two wheelers of morning runners and walkers.
On right side there is a garden where huge statue of shivaji riding the horse is erected. Our pre and post run exercises are done here.
Fad out
Fad in
Your life partner is your running partner :
Running with Sheila is a new experience. Walking with her has been quite a common feature , but walking is usually related to traveling together or during shopping or at times going from point A to point B. But running exclusively with your life partner as your running partner can be interesting.
I am basically a solo runner. Of course I do love to run in groups where I do get one or two bakras who are ready to zelofy my bakwas, at times I run with runner friend for a short common distance ; but given a choice I run solo. It helps me to observe. Also at times During solo run there are phases of self talking : either my mind gets focused from stray thought to something more concrete or at times I end up more confused as my clear thoughts become hazy. either way it is a learning experience. And yes then those rare moments when either you loose sense of your physical body or you have few seconds of thoughtlessness and you have that feeling of absolute bliss.
Running with life partner can be very different for every one. Those wives who love to talk from all the topics : right from bête noir mother in law to neighbor’s dog can really add new angle to some one’s running .
Sheila primarily does not talk much during running ( so far ) . she loves her music , so one ear is given to music and second given to me knowing I have a talkative trait. In any case running may not be necessarily “ conversation oriented” , where is walking together can be easily conversation friendly.
As you run you pass by incoming walkers, fellow runners. There are males and there are females. Some males only see your wife and royally ignore you. With females things can be very different. Very few would like to see you as an opposite sex object. There can be many categories.
Category 1 :Some are so self obsessed that they are more bothered about whether they are being looked at and whether their divine presence is duly recognized and acknowledged by others at regular intervals. : of course looking has to be from appreciation point of view ( not in any bad sense: a female inherently knows which male staring is harmless one and which one is bad ) .
Expectation of appreciations can be in part or for the full package. It can be her hairstyle to her ultra fitness outfit , to her out of the world shoes and to the god gifted beauty.( most males do not register finer points or loose their sense of finer appreciation. They work at macro level .
Category 2 : she will look at your wife , assess what is she as overall package ( i.e god’s gift as primarily beauty , her fitness ware, her eye ware, her hairstyle , her shoes, whether she is happy in her life or not. All in few seconds. This ultra fast scanner may also give instant reaction. If she can find one of the shortcomings which will give her some kind of superiority complex trigger and there will be a fleeting smile and she will move on.
Category 3 : this incoming female runner will see you running along with a female but her seeing is different. she will look at you. Try to judge whether a) what can be the relationship between these two jokers. Are they married? If yes , are they happily married ? is there any chakkar going on between these two .? if yes , does it have potential to break any one or both the marriages ??
And most important : whether the female deserves the male or male deserve the female? ( the order can be any , the nature of question remains the same .)
Category 4 : it’s a tricky type . she will look at you but it’s all question of timing. There are chances that she has already seen you . the trick is to see her seeing you ( then only you will know that some one has at least attempted scanning you )
One can go on but I think it’s time for fad out
Fad out……………
Fad in …..
Today it seems it is couple running day. Leena and Viswas Joshi are running together and they meet us together as they climb the kanheri hill .They appreciate as they see me resuming my running after a long gap.
Surekha and Mangesh dixit …..are few hundred meters behind and are together
Komal and Shardul Adhikari are running together as we cross them mid way.
All of them are virtually together. Where as we did get separated at kanheri .
kanheri we did get separated for few minutes as Sheila decided to walk and I continued running.
Fad out
Fad in
Today I am surprised to see many of my friends running in BNP rather than at satara.
Dhanraj, Sidhi and Suvendu are running and trying to compensate the loss by at least doing two full loops.
We all greet each other with “ are yaar tum /aap yahaan …?? You were supposed to be in Satara.
Sonal has her own ways of solving “ missing the satara feelings “
She is doing five rounds of kanheri and three rounds of gandhi tekdi.
Last year she could do three outside trips, this year it looks more runs as home runs.
Her passion for running keeps her on tight ropes. Typically she has to get up at 4 or 4.30 . she has to wind up by 8.00 am and leave ( either BNP or if it is road run she has to plan accordingly ) between 9.30 to 11 she has to cook and wind up all the home related duties. Staying in joint family makes her job tough as there can be more opinions ( as compared to staying in nuclear family ) on her performance as a multi tasking person.
During the run there are standard good morning/morning or hari oms.
In BNP there are some friends/known faces/casual acquaintance with whom your connection remains at good mornings and Hari oms.
Shanky hugs me as we cross while running. Ankur is late .On Saturday while having garam ukala near my office , he had planned to do all the internal loops both the times. Looks like he will have to run little longer beyond 8 .
Running does not give time for formal introduction .Many faces are known to Sheila , but she is not able to co relate. In recent times she is more regular ( as compared to my hibernation ) as she had first started with couch to 5 km then 5km to 10 km followed by 21km group of BNP gr. She is also part of Dumbelled????
Her’s is also a tight rope exercise. ( for many female runners the story is somewhat similar ) Our elder one ,Riva has early morning school followed by Tvisha’s school at 10 am
If she has to do dumbbell or moderate run , she has to get up by 4.30. prepare the tiffin for Riva and Tvisha. Reach and join the group at required time. She must come back by 7.10 /7.15 so as Riva can leave in time . This becomes more tricky when I am on tour or get delayed from my swimming or cycling.
Fad out
Fad in
IUCCA-NCRA-TIFR campus within Pune university is of recent years as compared to British established University. You may not see the stone buildings , but the spread out layout and green space is very soothing. Running through university generates interesting thought process.
“ How about an ideal situation where in both of us are working in this kind of green University at some faculty level. We stay within the University ,work within University and remain health conscious with regular running , swimming along with one of the sport being pursued.
For few minutes I indulge in this kind of shekhchilli – khayalee pulao as we pass by one of the canteen where aromas of early morning food preparation stimulates different chain reaction . “ we will come here to eat post run”
Fad out
Fad in
The canteen is exactly a college canteen /university should be.
Open , green ,no proper structure, sitting at multi level in random style , an open ganpati madir within the canteen area. Perfect environment to do all kind of intellectual /creative/gossip oriented endless discussions.
We order sabudana khichadi followed by coffee, but idli and wada are more visible at most of the tables. Looks like canteen is being run by some anna and not son of the soil- Marathi manoos.
I voluntarily go and congratulate one 50 plus runner who had impressed both of us as he was constantly running at around 6 ka pace , even on inclines. As we were running in loops and we were crossing various runners couple of times. He is happy with my compliments but my gesture does not lead to further talk as a) my order is announced and b) he smiles, shakes hands and goes blank c) I am aware that Sheila is waiting and she will definitely comment “ Phir chalu ho gaye”.So I end up congratulating some one who looks more a professor type( but fitness conscious ) without knowing his name.
Talking to strangers/casual acquaintance is part of my traveling DNA. Anything or anybody if slightly interest me , I have no Ego as I try to explore more. At times I am ignored, insulted but most of the time it results in making some one happy and me learning little more about life. More then Sheila it’s Riva who finds it sweetly irritating. “ Dad with you I am not sure whether we will reach to desired destination at required time . You may stop anywhere , get involved with some happening or person which interest you to explore more.”
Fad out……
Fad in
Sheila has improved her strides. Earlier she had the habit of dragging part of her lifting . The feet leaving the ground contact used to make typical extra sound. Looks like all the coaches and her running friends have slowly introduced this improvement.. At times she talks about her slow pace and I remind her that please target 21 km first , pace should not be issue. I do not know what have been BNP gr coaches’ point of views. It’s obvious that different coach can have different thought process. I do not want to overly influence her .
Her runs with Maheshbhai at relatively fast pace, group runs with Mahendra naik, Tushar ,Nitin G , Neha G ,Surekha Dixit,Leena Joshi have added to her learning curve. Her various organized 10 K ( twice in bandra and twice on Borivli west ( including total sports ) have added to her confidence.
At Pune my friend Nitin Pandya ( part of pune runners ) belongs to the group of purists who believe in simple formula for all
- Run only 5 KM till you master : 5 km in 30 minutes
- Next stage : keep practicing 10 km with 60 minutes target . till you achieve that do not dream of 21 km
Sheila has already run with Nitin Pandya and his group on NIBM road near cloud nine rolling inclines in Pune in past .We happen to join them on one of the scheduled monthly formation run.
In formation run the complete group runs at one pace. The faster one has to compromise to the slowest .It is basically a team spirit. Sheila was part of the group and soon realized that it’s just not possible to keep the pace with their slowest ( which was deciding factor for the pace of the whole formation )when the path chosen has great inclines. Soon she slowed down and Nitin had to give her company as we were his guests where as the group continued at their pace.
Fad out……..
Fad in…….
I am doing back to back two Sunday 10 km plus runs. In between I have attempted 4 km at 6 ka pace. Trying different things to get different signal intensity ( pain shoot ups )from injury.
After the run the plantar fasciitis needs special care.
I have asked my factory to develop special tool to help me do my own deep tissue massage. Today night there will be small DTM session with myself .
Actually I have become more bold with my injury and with the whole my recovery process.
We are running with minimum walk breaks . Sheila is OK with the same .First break is at 2.5 KM. Second one is around 5 Km, but Sheila decides to run as she has decided to walk the kanheri hill.
On return run we have only one mini walk break. She tells me about Maheshbhai’s advise “ do not stop at same spot for walk breaks as you tend to stop again at the same place “
Coming back from Kanheri is always easy and at times more enjoyable.
If you have reached Kanheri much earlier then others it rejuvenates at different level
Running solo on kanheri to and/or fro without any one else in site stimulates mind and you can resonate more easily with nature.
The monkeys in this region are different from the one we see till 4 km .
There were times when I could see a lot many. Today not much are visible.
After a long gap when I reach kanheri base , I continue my running with faster pace on the steps of kanheri till the ticket window. Keep Running on the steps after 5.75 KM ( approx or so ) is kind of “ make yourself more happy “ exercise.
Sheila casually tells me like a sincere student, “ Oh we are told to return from the base by touching the board/steps walls “
Fad out.
shailesh 