Jesse Ojuka

The blue morning sky glows through my blinds and mixes with the sleep in my eyes as they slowly open. “Today is the day,” I tell myself. I lay in bed, not in the usual rush to vault out of bed to the mission ahead of me. Instead, I take five slow deep breaths to infuse presence into my body. I feel my heartbeat pulse through my arms, down through my legs. Finally, I feel the pulse in my toes. Now I am present in my body. I know I probably shouldn’t, but I reach for my bedside table and grab my laptop. I open it and check my emails. Nothing. Then I check WhatsApp to see a text from Gil replying to my text from last night about how I can feel burnout creep up on me like a goblin. “We can go for a walk in nature when you’re here,” she says. I don’t reply. I click on YouTube and watch some Donald Glover interviews for his new TV show. They did a lot of press. I don’t mind, he’s one of my favourite creators ever. Thirty minutes pass and a kind morning quietly sneaks into a lazy one. I shut my laptop screen but still, I don’t get up. I lay there in guilty tranquillity.

The realisation that laziness is the only thing keeping me in bed attacks me like a bull. I leap out of bed. The nervousness that would usually discourage me is smothered by delight. My smiling face greets me as I walk in front of the bathroom mirror to brush my teeth.

I grab the green yoga mat from our messy laundry room. I’m pretty sure I’m the only one that ever uses it. First, I’ll stretch my back, then my legs, then my lower back again. “I feel like I’m ready to do this,” I say to myself with as much mysterious courage as I can dig up.

Outside is a wet world. The wind is soft. But the weather isn’t anywhere bad enough to prevent me from this run. Usually, I would start with a slow walk. Immediately I start at a faster pace than I normally would.

One kilometre in, I begin my jog. I turn off the music momentarily. I hear my breath beneath my headphones. The sound makes me feel even more out of breath. I try to focus and steady my breathing to a balanced pace despite the fact I want to swallow all the oxygen out of the atmosphere. My steps are a heavy trudge. My lips are dry and desperate for moisture. My back is loose. The wind pushes and pulls me like a pirate ship at the mercy of the sea breeze.
My thoughts dip in and out of the present like I’m walking on hot coal, trying to separate my mind from my body. My legs keep running. Pedestrians bend and freeze to make sure they don’t interrupt my flow. I stick my thumbs up just for a split second.

Nine kilometres in, just one kilometre to the finish. My heartbeat climbs, and my legs turn to stallions. My breaths become belly-deep. I give my all knowing the end is near. Six hundred metres away, my neighbour is in front of me. I don’t have the time or energy to give her my usual wide smile so I whoosh past with a quick and tight grin. Her middle-aged face holds more respect than usual.