Kulovy blesk

Casto se to tak sejde, ze na cestu do a z Prahy mam sotva dva dny a do toho pochuzky, navstevy, zarizovacky a sem tam pivo. Nejinak tomu bylo i minuly tyden: odvezt kamaradovo auto do Kamenice nad Lipou (out of all places!), najit spoj na Prahu, vyridit x schuzek, pospravovat a pozarizovat vse potrebne pro maminku, probrat dulezita temata s brachou a jeste stihnout aspon jednoho kamarada a par piv.

Ve vysledku vykazala tahle bleskova akce super parametry. Povazte sami, behem dvou a pul dne totiz:

• 3x za sebou vstavam mezi treti a patou hodinou;
• 4x jedu vlakem;
• 2x absolvuji rodinnou seslost;
• 2x se cpu a piju pivo behem ITB veceri, behem nichz vedle me sedi:
  • 12Honza a Danuska;
  • Tucnak;
  • Liska.
• poprve vejdu do Trailpointu a seznamim se osobne s Evzenem;
• 2x vybehnu: 9 km s UltraJitkou, potom 8 km s Tucnakem – potkavame RIDa;
• vyzvednu kolobezku (zase uz!) u Ladi Blahy, kterezto setkani demonstruje propojenost ruznych svetu: sveruje se mi, ze (neuspesne) montoval cyklotasky na kolobku Advidovi;
• 17 km jedu na Mibu GT Split pres Prahu;
• 12 km projdu Prahou.

Ustvana…

… a vysmata.

Takze kamaradi, mame vas radi – vsem diky!

More on friendship

I wrote about friends and friendships earlier but somehow, it is never enough…

When I was a teenager my older brother told me that I should cherish all the good friendships as with the age, one only looses friends and almost never gains new ones. At first, I did not believe him as there were so many new and beautiful and smart people around me and I felt there were new friendships waiting to be grabbed and developed on every corner.

Little did I know that the real friendships don’t come to one’s door too often. The older we get, the more difficult it is to distill the reasons why people get attracted to us. In the past, in my naivety, I let many people close to me and did not see (or did not want to see) why they wanted to declare a friendship to me at all.

Throughout the years that I lived abroad, I lost contact with many good friends and found new friends instead. Except that there was hardly any comparison between the Old ones and the New ones. The New ones co-created my new social life, they were there to talk to and to laugh with and to drink beer with but somehow, with just a few exceptions, these new friendships remained rather shallow. Their roots were simply not deep enough to weather the storm of my life style. Just like my brother predicted.

On the Old friendship scene, luckily the situation was completely different: even though I haven’t seen some of my youth friends for many years, whenever the opportunity was there, we somehow always managed to get together and step halfway into a conversation as if we stopped talking an hour ago – rather than many years ago.

Last time in Prague, I finally proved my brother wrong. Yes, I have met a couple of old friends and yes, the encounters were great and felt like coming home. But I have also met new friends, my running friends that is. And guess what? The time we spent together was at least equally as good. I felt so welcome in their presence, in their homes – as if warm chocolate milk and blanket were offered to me (well, they were, actually!). I spent a lot of time with interesting people conducting interesting conversations. With people who took their time and effort to make me feel good, uncovered the hidden landscapes of their minds in order to help me to uncover my own weaknesses, with people who charged me with lots of energy, who showed me their affection and made me feel good about the way I am.

Maybe it is the running, a universal sport that outgrew in a passion (and even a life style, for some of us) that breaks all the barriers between us? If that is the case, I couldn’t have picked a better hobby.

Thank you. And the Shoe Fairy.

My virtual co-runner

Although between our houses there is a 1000 km gap, we run together quite often. Making an appointment with her is so easy that I almost never refuse to go, even though it involves early morning getting up. The only thing we need is the itch to put on the running shoes and start.

How does it work? Before each run, we agree on time, music selection and running course – while I lead her through the cycling paths around Leiden, she shows me her own surroundings in and around Prague. So today, this is where we were (well, me only virtually):

Of course, after each mutual run there is time to chat and enjoy a drink or too… It seems like we are bringing RunningFreeOnline and DailyMile to the next level. Thanks, Iva!

10.1 km to the harbour

Wandelweekend in NL/B

Back in the Middle Ages when life was complicated, the landlords of Breda (The Netherlands) and Brabant (Belgium) managed to get involved in a number of rather complex treaties, agreements, land-swaps and sales. As a result, until now the border between  NL and B around the villages Baarle-Nassau and Baarle-Hertog counts about 22 enclaves and in many situations it divides villages, streets and even houses to Belgian or Dutch sector.

We have friends living in Baarle so spending our annual ‘wandelweekend’ there promised numerous border crosses and a lot of good beer.

On Saturday morning we departed early to join the rest of our friends at the breakfast table. The daily walk at the banks of Merkse (the local version of Rio Grande) started around 1 pm…

During the first kilometers the walking pace was killing… except when the city-people spotted a spider, frog, bird or any other unusual creature…

We hardly ever stopped.

By the end of the day, Ling, the wandelweekend dog, ended up exhausted (if April was there, she wouldn’t have survived).

So 15 km down the road, we called it a day and returned to our friends’ farm.

Next morning, a different walk was selected and the encounters with nature got wilder:

The end of the day brought exhaustion again:

But all together, we managed another 14 walking kms. I have to admit I missed my running shoes…

Spring Sunny Sunday at the lake

After many rainy, windy and foggy weekends, this Sunday the sun woke us up and remained shining untill we decided that indoor gym is a bit of a waste. I looked up a track around the Vlietland Lakes that I wanted to run for several weeks. I asked V to drive me there (building a subtle hint in my question): “Would you please drive me there – and maybe once we are there, if you like it, you can join me for a couple of miles?” I showed her that the oblong shape of the paths around the lakes and focused the description on the road cutting one of the lakes in two and suggested that if we parked near the middle we could start running together and decide half way how far we wanted to go. She agreed!

So we parked close to the middle of the oblong route next to a restaurant (W), undressed to short sleeves and hit the road (NE). The sun was shining and it looked like a perfect day – except that the rest of Holland dicided to discover the lakes today as well. Luckily after about 2 km into the run (N end) we found a footpath through the bushes and trees on the lake shore and continued running on it for the next 3-4 km. We were chatting and laughing and watching the people passing by, children playing on the lake shore, cyclists around. And suddenly there was the moment to decide what to do next. V looked at me and said “I am not tired, are you?” Of course I was tired like hell not either so we ran all the way to the south end and as we were turning back northwards, this conversation took place:

V (disturbed): I hear voices!

Me (disturbed more): Shall we stop? Do you want some water? Dextrose? Shall I get the car quickly?

V: No, I am okay. I wonder what the voices are…

Me (still very disturbed): Are you sure you are okay?

V: Oh, that is my iPhone talking to me.

Other than that, the run went really smoothly – no earphones in my ears but the delight of running with my partner and my best friend was better than music.

At the end we clocked almost 13 km and rewarded ourselves by fresh fruit smoothie and some shopping.  What else a girl needs?

Eureka!

Monday morning 6.30 in Eureka, Montana: Holiday, fresh snow, company of friends (all asleep). Putting on my running gear and quietly leaving the house while it is still dark. The main road through Tobacco Valley is not far and and as I am trying to carefully place my feet on the slippery surface, my breath freezes.

The only sound I hear comes from under my feet as my shoes crush the frozen snow. The sensation remains fascinating every day. I run.

Later on, after a true American breakfast, we leave the house to spend a wonderful sunny day skiing in Whitefish.

Janathon Day 32 – Epilogue

Janathon had all signs of a great journey for me: it was totally unpredictable and highly adventurous. After coming across the Janathon logo accidentally, in no time I had so many virtual friends around me, people who I did not know and yet they were supporting me as I went along. So thank you, Phil, for posting some boosts to my short runs. And thank you, Lena, for running so much that I just  had to go out there and do at least my 5km loop. And thank you, Cheeta, for the inspiring stories and pictures. And thank you, Cathy, for pulling all this together. Thank you all the 200+ Janathoners who signed up and struggled throughout the cold days with me.  Thank you, Bear Runner. And thank you, Running Shadow, 12HonzaDe, Peggy and others… Although I don’t live in CZ anymore, the Czech running blogs provide for so much wisdom, fun and motivation.