Lying awake at 4am, Michael Whittaker’s demons came out to warn him that running a half marathon in the rain when legally blind was a bad idea. But he ran anyway.  

It was the sound of the rain, slung sidelong into the singing shields of the windowpanes, that woke me, shortly before the 4am alarm. I had beaten the count.

I lay and listened to the wind and the wet, wrestling at the besieged flesh of the trees beyond, appreciating the pre-dawn moaning of the storm.

I felt relief.

In such conditions (a pessimistic forecaster had suggested the possibility of hail), nobody could expect to run a half marathon at their best.

All the gleeful, left-shoulder demons were up and about. “You’re legally blind. Do you want your teeth smashed apart, at pace, again, more stitches, a broken ankle or elbow or orbital bone, the gawping, further humiliation?”

No.

So, I consoled myself, it would be an understandably slow run. A safe and sympathetic attempt. No one, not least myself, could pass undue judgment on an impaired performance today.

And so, in the morning song of a storm, the vanity of my potential could, for today, remain safely unredeemed. (A dream, at worst, all but lost, to be hopelessly toasted within the neon gleam of fourteen martinis too many.) I could, without losing face, be forgiven for falling short of my stated intentions, and excuse myself the exposure an earnest, everything-out-there effort entails.

Accordingly, relief. Maybe, I thought, showering, it would be enough, today, to move, despite the storm, board a ferry, cross a harbour, to alight in Devonport, to number myself amongst the amassed brave, to run alongside my friend and running guide, Zeb. Through the saturated suburban streets of Auckland’s North Shore, down the lanes of the Southern motorway, over and under the mythic, hulking iron of the Harbour Bridge, through the nautical remnants of the Wynyard Quarter, home to the finishing chute at Victoria Park, home to my love, Meike.

Even to complete this event, in and of itself, would be, simply, an outrageous thing to do. There need be no shame in not kneecapping the clock today. No one would tell me I had let them down. This was no life-or-death concern. I ate oats and ice cream for breakfast.

And then we ran …

Goldfish Buddhism

… And then we ran.

Through the slick streets of a city, chasing thunderheads, daring a dream, flowing, kicking up sparks. I forgot that my training had been lackluster, at best, and that, on paper, there was no way I could satisfy my hump-day hopes of a sub-80 half marathon. Injury and malaise and COVID and impairment had no claim on these moments. I expelled the desire to think of “motivational” ire, and the angst of performance expectation.

I melted into my legs, into stride and cadence and rhythmic glide and form and breath and economic propulsion, summoned beyond my footfalls only by Zeb’s voice and direction. (“Right corner upcoming, stay tight on my voice, drink station soon, I’ll grab us water, small sips, we’re good, lean into the climb, bring it home.”) I felt very little pain. I was a man made only of 20 second increments. I began and ended with each 20-second count. That was all.

You might call it goldfish Buddhism.

And yet there were jokes (one involving my on-the-run rendition of TLC’s Waterfalls, when I ploughed into a particularly deep puddle, misunderstanding Zeb’s direction to follow his voice around it). There was camaraderie between those that we ran alongside. There was Zeb.

I didn’t ask him for times or distances. I was a pair of legs. I was only as good as my form. I was caffeine. I was only 20 seconds long. I was running, and nothing else.

What a run. Over seven minutes off my first proper, guided run, clocked in the same event in January.

With thanks to Achilles International NZ. With appreciation to Whippets Running Project, my first and dear running family. And, most of all, to that most singular of men, Zeb.

That 1:20, speculated upon in January’s wake, has fallen. For 2023, 1:15, and, dare I say it, 1:10 are on notice. (Since the race, I have discovered that the New Zealand record for a visually impaired runner is 1:14:37.)