The morning was clear, the pollution was low and Nehru Park beckoned for a run.
I asked the young boy to join me for a part of it. We decided to alternate between running inside the park and the Shanti Path loop. It was a lazy Christmas morning with little traffic; lesser than a usual Sunday.
We teased each other calling names chaparganju and chintu and hilarious, mindless ribbing. Round after round went by – teasing, chatting, enjoying the late morning run, the air that was so much better, the rays of sunlight pouring through the trees.
With a couple of miles to go to get us to 15 kilometres, the young boy hazarded he had done perhaps five. I told him I would tell him the number after one more round of the Shanti Path loop. Then he second guessed wondering if it was more – I seem to be running for a long time, he said.
At the end of the loop, when I revealed that we only had a mile to go to round up to fifteen, he couldn’t believe it.
I couldn’t either. We had simply enjoyed a morning out, kept it to an easy pace and built up naturally, pace and distance, to finish the most amazing run of the year, at the most perfect park on Earth.
Writing about Running 