Rockabilly Psychosis

This PTSD lark is a constant round of fun and games, I can tell you. About 10 months or so ago I reckoned I was emerging from the depths of despair, a slightly broken, but put-back-together, guy ready to take tentative steps back into the world.

I was even the recipient of an invitation to a party...'I'm normal!' I told myself. Safe to mix in genteel company, in the presence of quickly quaffed alcohol and loud music. Why not? I thought. Once was in charge of a busy, central-London fire station and a team of pretty lively individuals. I can manage the polite conversation, soft-shoe-shuffling and sipping of port required at a celebratory get-together, surely?

Here's the thing. And I suppose it should have sounded alarm bells: I barely knew the host and had never met any of the guests. In the past, I would have convinced myself the guests would be so gloriously astounded by my dancing skills, my power drinking, and my war stories that I would be elevated from 'unknown guest' to 'must-have present henceforth' in the blink of an eye.

So with those thoughts in my mind, plus a bottle of port in my motor, and my dancing shoes on, I jumped in the new 1litre Fiesta Bad Boy, and headed over to Edinburgh for the party of the year. Let me just repeat that: The Party of The Year. Please hold that thought.

I arrived around mid-afternoon at a pretty remote house outside Edinburgh with huge grounds and a collection of smart automobiles outside. The kind where the cost of a bumper repair would eclipse the money I paid for the Bad Boy. I was dressed in my gym gear (come casual, they said) and strutted through the open door displaying as much non-existent confidence as I could muster.

The host, a former Royal Marine named Matt, was in the kitchen preparing food while sipping a glass of champagne and dressed like Michael Portillo.

'Hi Matt,' I boomed (booming is definitely a sign of absent confidence).

'Dave! What the Fuck? Have you got a change of clothes? Please tell me you've got a change of clothes! Serena (name changed to protect the nearly killed) will go fucking berserk!'

Before I could argue the definition of casual, in swanned Serena as if on a magic carpet of grace and elegance. Her eyes looked me up and down and her sneer said all it needed to.

'Err...I think I've got a pair of jeans in the car...'I spluttered.

20 minutes later, a freshly ironed pair of Levis replaced my jogging bottoms and one of Matt's shirts covered my tattooed arms. As the guests arrived I was introduced to Tarquin, Philippa, Theodore, Angelica, Rupert and Cordelia.

If I cursed my Mum and Dad for having the complete absence of creativity in calling me 'Dave' I cursed them 1000 times.

Clearly, the only strategy to overcome this nightmare of epic proportions was to employ the tried and tested trick of getting absolutely wankered. I drank red wine like a tramp drinks cider, then opened the port. By this stage, I couldn't give a flying fuck that I used a wine glass for my port. If I could have laid my hands on a pint pot that would have been the port receptacle of choice.

Of course, as my level of inebriation rose, my dancing and jokes improved exponentially. Along with the disappearance of my reluctance to fart and swear.

Now, this is all standard fayre for a Subversive tale of alcohol consumption. However, there are additions that had never been in the mix previously. My pals Kerry Quetiapine, Sally Sertraline and Ponsonby Propranolol.  Their acquaintance with strong alcohol had never been attempted before.

The night wore on, and at around 02:00 there was just me and the two hosts left. We were outside, sitting around a small bonfire, drinking port. Then it happened:

'Dave,' said Serena. 'Matthew tells me you have PTSD. Why do you have PTSD?'

Completely taken aback, and with my mind awash with alcohol and anti-psychotic, prescription drugs, I attempted: 'I think I took particularly poor care of myself in the past and now I'm paying for it.'

'Matthew tells me that you are heavily medicated. You do realise those drugs do you no good whatsoever, don't you? So why do you take them?'

'Errm...' I spluttered, as I felt a dark, descending cloud of embarrassment and shame envelope me. 'My doctor thinks that the meds help, so I'm following his advice.'

'Listen, David,' said Serena, employing my Sunday name. 'All you need is to get all of this stuff off your chest. You need to speak to someone and just get it all out there. I'm that someone, so start by telling me about Grenfell Tower..'

'Errm...' I said, using the oft-repeated phrase that really translated as 'FUCK OFF AND LEAVE ME ALONE!' 'I kinda think that those end-of-life experiences are pretty sacred and should remain with me and those I accompanied on that journey.'

'END OF LIFE EXPERIENCES!' Thundered Serena. 'You're not a fucking poet, are you? So stop using such flowery language and just tell me what happened!'

And so the scene was set for the next 30 minutes. Serena demanding horror stories, me sinking lower and lower into my seat, and the mixture of medication and alcohol making bonds of destruction and annihilation in my mind.

When the seat could swallow me no further, and there appeared to be no end in sight to the cross-examination, I got up wearily and said: 'I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to bed.'

Serena angrily spluttered something about hospitality, but I was moving faster than Prince Andrew at a Fresher's Ball. I headed toward the very well-appointed, ground floor guest room I had been provided, where I closed the door and breathed a huge sigh of relief. This was such a mistake. Believing I could spring back into the world of parties, new people, alcohol and manipulative treatment. What a cunt I was. I wish I was at home. But I can't go anywhere yet due to my inebriation. I'll need to sit it out then escape in the morning.

Lock the door....yeah, lock the fucking door...they might be so pissed off with me they want to reiterate their anger.

FUCK! No fucking lock! Why is there no lock? 

Then the sound of blaring dance music exploded from upstairs accompanied by pounding and thumping on the floor above my head. 

What the fuck is going on? I don't understand what's happening. I knew Serena was angry by my refusal to talk...maybe this is her way of letting me know I'm not wanted. 

They're gonna come down here and have a go at me, I know they are. They're going to come through that unlocked door, snarling and shouting at me. I need a weapon. In this well-appointed room, with tasteful paintings on the wall and a peach aroma infused en-suite, there's not even a baseball bat or a hunting knife. What the fuck is wrong with these people? 

I sat with my back against the wall, waiting for the door to open, ready to engage in combat. Then I rang my (much) better half. Yes, it was 03:00 but this was an ambush situation.

'Hi babe, it's me. Listen, Matt and Serena are really pissed off; I've really upset them. They've been demanding horror stories. They're about to come into my room and there's no lock. I've looked for a weapon but can't find one but I'm pretty sure I can kill them both with my bare hands.'

I heard the words I'd just spoken. This isn't normal. I'm alcohol and anti-psychotic drug-affected, I'm far from cured of PTSD and Hyper-Vigilance and shouldn't be away from home. The Party of the Year.

'Dave, go to bed and go to sleep. Leave in the morning and come straight home,' spoke the voice of reason.

Four hours later I sneaked out of Matt and Serena's like a thief in the night, jumped into the Bad Boy and headed home where I locked the door, bidding a final farewell to alcohol, and took my meds. 

A week or so later, my mobile phone screen showed an unknown caller desperately trying to get hold of me. Unusually, I answered:

'Hi, Mr Waterman?'

'It is, who's this please?'

'This is Dr Moreau from the Community Mental Health Team. We've received an emergency referral from your psychotherapist. I need you to come in and see me urgently. I have a report that you attended a party in Edinburgh, had a disagreement with the hosts, and planned to murder them both in their bed.'

I was impressed with the level of embellishment and pleased that I had such fantastic material for a blog post, but tried to explain the reality of the situation.

It didn't matter. As soon as I said: 'I can kill them both with my bare hands' I was never going to win.

So what now? Well, my medication was adjusted to slow down an 'immediate aggressive response.' I've had no further contact from anyone at The Party of the Year, and I'm not expecting you, Dear Reader, to invite me to a party anytime soon.

In Lunar Shadows Slowly

 As I sit to write this, I feel compelled to issue a warning. In the 15 years this blog has been in existence, I've tried, sometimes hamfistedly, to make it humorous. Unfortunately, in what's about to be written, you'll find no humour.

In 1999 the London Fire Brigade's fleet of appliances included five Fire Rescue Units (FRUs). They were specialist vehicles that attended the most extreme and critical incidents that the natives of London could throw at them. Post 9/11, 7/7 and other high profile disasters, the London Fire Brigade now have 15 FRUs. So in 1999, with just five FRUs serving the whole of the capital, we were busy, busy, busy. It exposed the 2% of staff that made up the FRU crews to many more critical incidents than a standard firefighter, but created an elite and experienced band of practitioners. As I look back, I can say that it was a pretty transient position; FRU firefighters often moved on rather quickly. Those that didn't and stayed for the long haul, are prone to illness, alcoholism, addiction and depression in retirement. That's probably not a surprise, right?

Back to 1999. I was a newly promoted Sub Officer, in love with my job, confident (arrogant, possibly), but cared greatly for my men and women. It was some time during the summer; I can't be precise when, but I remember the stifling confines of the Sub Officer's room on the third floor of Battersea Fire Station. It was a night shift, and we had entered the wee hours.

As I dozed on my perfunctory bed, the familiar sound of wailing alarms and bright lights roused me from my sweaty slumber. In less than 60 seconds I was dressed and seated in the commander's position of the FRU. Moments later, I was joined by my four-man crew, and we were barrelling through the empty London streets on our way to 'RTA: Persons Trapped' in Sutton Common Road. I settled down, with one ear on the main-scheme radio listening out for an informative message from the incident. I never ceased to marvel at the driver's skill and speed as he zipped through red lights and across mini-roundabouts to get us in attendance as quickly as possible.

As we rounded a bend in the road we came upon the incident. Two fire engines were already in attendance along with a couple of police cars, an ambulance and a high-speed ambulance car that replaced the London Ambulance Service's helicopter (HEMS) during the hours of darkness. At an odd angle in the road sat a white Ford Fiesta RS Turbo. It had obviously been on its roof and had resettled on its wheels. From my position I could see two occupants and I could hear one. A high-pitched, male voice shouting and swearing.

My crew dismounted, and without the need for instruction, set about preparing the hydraulic tools we might need to extricate the stricken vehicle's occupants. I followed protocol and reported to the Incident Commander. He was also a Sub Officer, the same rank as myself, but sported a partially fastened tunic and an unshaven chin. The few words we exchanged indicated he had no clue what he was doing and was relieved an FRU was now in attendance. I made a mental note that protocol could fuck right off and it would be my orders alone that would resolve this incident.

I approached the Fiesta which was surrounded by firefighters doing very little. An attempt was being made by a couple of guys to release the mangled passenger door, behind which sat a young woman of probably 17 years or so. She appeared to be unharmed but her eyes were only partially open and she was worryingly silent. Next to her, in the driver's seat, sat a pluke-ridden, shaven-headed young man of maybe 20. It appeared that a broken clavicle had punched through his chest exposing milky, white bone against his grey and bloodied shirt. And fuck me, he was letting everyone know about it. Not too much wrong with him, then.

I saw the person I wanted. Raya, a diminutive, Israeli HEMS Doctor, stood by the car trying to make herself heard by the firefighters surrounding her. 

'Hi, Raya, what needs doing?' I asked.

'Dave, they're not listening to me. I need the girl out right now.'

Nothing more needed to be said. Raya and I had worked together several times before and we both knew what her words meant. While the firefighters were pissing about trying to ensure the safety of the girl's cervical spine, she was dying. I pulled away the two guys that had now prised open the passenger's door. I heard angry comments directed at me but they meant nothing. I pulled out my non-issue lock knife, cut the seatbelt, threw the knife into the footwell, and scooped the girl out of the seat and into my arms. Her eyes fluttered open and a huge, hooped earring and long, blonde hair, settled against my tunic sleeve. As I carried her gently to the waiting ambulance trolley I looked into her eyes and said: 'I've got you.'

She looked back at me, through deep, black pupils set against blue eyes. I realise this sounds dramatic, but I promise I relate only to what happened. There was a connection...both a physical one and a meeting of souls. Then, the girl's eyes fluttered again and she became lighter in my arms. I knew she had died. I literally felt the life leave her body.

I placed her body on the trolley and it was wheeled off to the waiting ambulance with Raya doing everything she could to turn the situation around. There was to be no turning around.

The rest of the incident is something of a blur, but we extricated the driver and he was transported to hospital, swearing and spitting. It was reckoned he had entered the bend at a high speed, lost control of the car, and rolled it. The police accident investigation team would establish precisely what happened, having closed the road due to it being a fatal event.

In 1999 I was a fairly green firefighter, despite achieving promotion pretty rapidly. Although not my first fatal incident, this event upset me deeply. I was the father of three daughters and a son so I felt the unnecessary death of a young person heavily. The connection established in life and death felt elemental and real.

The day that I realised something was definitely amiss was a few weeks after the event. I was off duty, it was late at night, and my body and mind were numbed by strong alcohol. I lay in my bed, knocked out by the alcohol. However, in the adjoining bedroom slept my five-year-old daughter but my drinking was never a problem (despite that, I realise criticism of my parenthood is invited here). Sometime through the night, I heard my bedroom door open and a weight place itself on the end of my bed. My daughter often crawled into my bed during the night, so I pulled back the duvet and said 'In you get, Charly.'

Nothing.

I opened my eyes and looked through the gloom at the form sitting on my bed. It wasn't Charly. The huge, hooped earrings confirmed the identity of my visitor. She looked at me with her hands in her lap, then rose and left through the open door.

How did I feel about this, you may ask? The only word I can find is 'comforted.'

Let's fast forward 23 years. I'm in my weekly meeting with my psychotherapist and tell him the story above. I feel somewhat embarrassed to say that I failed to get through the telling of it without deep upset and tears. I was told that my experience was very common in the recent aftermath of trauma.

'What if I told you I saw her last week?' I asked.

We discussed this and settled that I had failed to let the girl go. EMDR, an end to the connection, and a period of mourning were suggested.

'I don't think I'm ready for that. She feels safe here with me,' I said.

I suppose this, right here, the writing of this blog is my attempt at letting her go. Cod psychotherapy carried out by a mental defective.

But...I'm still not sure I'm ready for this. She still feels safe here with me.

Creatures of My Dreams Raise Up and Dance With Me

Before we begin the self-directed therapy phase of this plan, I thought I might detail my descent into Randle P. McMurphy territory for posterity. McMurphy was, of course, Jack Nicholson's character in Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Now, I might be mad, but I'm not so bat-shit insane to think I might lay claim to anything approaching Jack Nicholson's charismatic display of lunacy in the brilliant 1975 film. But a Jack Nicholson reference is more palatable than the more accurate Norman Bates one.

I retired from the London Fire Brigade in May 2019. I had a pretty successful career, if we discount one rather large hiccup, and loved that job like Katie Price loves...horses (I know what you thought I would say there, but I no longer feel empowered to criticise others, having joined the ranks of cock-loving nutbar lunatics like Price).

I was convinced that a new page was turned. The book was closed on my previous career, and nothing I had experienced had any lasting impact on me, either psychologically or emotionally. In fact, I was regarded as so immune from impact, a colleague once said:

'You're a fucking psychopath, Dave. We're on our way back from the scene of utter devastation, and you want to stop the fire engine to buy cakes.'

Indeed, I wore that immunity like a bombproof coat for around eight months after retirement. Then I became aware that despite continuing hyper-vigilance, I was no longer going to bed knowing that I might be crashed out at any moment by bright lights and wailing alarms to some life-changing emergency. I suppose the ever-present fight or flight reflex calmed down, knowing the worst thing that might happen locally was the theft of a bicycle.

But fear not, Dear Reader, if you've attended multiple disasters over several years and decided you're too tough and hard to need any counselling, those disasters have the habit of returning to you at night. Yep, those dreams, reuniting me with the victims of Grenfell Tower, the Croydon Tram Crash, the Paddington Rail Crash, the Maryhill explosion, and a multitude of encounters that never made the press, became a nightly occurrence. My sleeping pattern was devastated, which led me to exhaustion and sleeping during the day. Whoever prefixed the term 'mare' with 'night' had clearly never really experienced the reliving of trauma because those dreams occurred during the day too.

Dreams are one thing. We all have them, and I hear you telling me to fuck right off and grow up. Flashbacks, however, are another. Usually occurring during quiet moments, but not considerate enough to remain absent while driving, being transported back 400 miles and any number of years is unsettling, let me tell you.

I remember being out with my wife in late 2019. We were joining some colleagues from Glasgow University for a few drinks, and I decided we would stay in an inexpensive hotel in the town. I arrived before my (much) better half, and as I rounded a corner and looked up at the multiple-floored, concrete building that was our hotel, I became suddenly cold and began to swoon (I know, I know...grow the fuck up). The last time I had been at this place was in May 2004 when I was choppered by RAF Puma from London to Glasgow as part of a nine-man team to recover casualties and victims from the Stockline Plastics factory explosion. This hotel had been our base for the duration of our stay. Even though most of our time was spent on the rubble pile amidst the death and destruction, we repaired here to shower and try to sleep. I never thought I'd see the place again. On my unplanned return in 2019, I checked in and was directed to a room that may as well have been the one I stayed in 15 years previous. I was right back there, with brick dust in my nostrils, the sobbing of heartbroken relatives in my ears, and blood on my hands.

Repeatedly being in the past, permanently exhausted and living among ghosts leads to confusion and paranoia. It's a slippery slope of denial. I believed I was tough and resilient, and the creators of my problems were the people around me. Showering and shaving became an effort. I'd always fancied growing a beard, but there's a massive difference between the impressively facially coiffured Brian Blessed and some apparently homeless, stinky guy wandering around in nothing but a grubby pair of Y-Fronts waving a fucking big knife about. Yes, that happened, and yes, the local constabulary were almost called. A discussion a few months later went something like this:

'I was going to call the police, but I was fearful of your reaction. I didn't want you fighting with the police.'

My reply: 'I think I probably would have thanked you.'

I suppose the lowest point arrived when the one thing that gave me purpose, my master's degree dissertation, was complete. A Travelodge in Inverness, a massive handful of Codeine, a bottle of Port and some soothing music was planned to see me off to sleep. Forever. 

I wanted my suicide to have as little impact as possible on anyone else, and I knew that my permanent absence would bring an end to the pain I caused others. I still have the written note on my phone that details my thought confirmation. 

However, I'm clearly not dead. So what happened? 

Well, a few things, really. A few words that provided a glimmer of hope from someone I love. Another person I love needing support in the face of illness. 13 months of Trauma-focused CBT. Oh yeah...and fucking loads of powerful meds. Occasional blips have resulted in the manipulation of medication, always resulting in an increase. I suppose that deciding that I might bare-handedly despatch two party hosts at 03:00 in Edinburgh encourages a greater degree of pharmaceutical control. I guess the next level is the padded cell and straitjacket.

So here we are in 2022. I'm still breathing but now resemble Randle P. McMurphy after his lobotomy. I spend vast amounts of time asleep, have wholly given up alcohol, and rarely leave the house. But things are much better than they were 12 months ago. And I'm alive. Kinda.

One Flew Over...

Here we are again. I did tell you 'maybe.' Last time we were here was in October when I told a tale of a flashback occurring in a centre of sporting endeavour while dressed like a dick.

What's happened since? I'll tell you what's happened since...we've entered a new year. New Year, New Me, right? Maybe. 

2022 sees the completion of my 13-month long period of Trauma-Focused CBT. Emerging from that is accompanied by some definite improvements. But the therapy hasn't been the fix-all intervention I hoped for. I shan't detail why because I'm not entirely sure whether it was the approach taken by the psychologist, my occasional diversionary tactics, a surfeit of problems too significant to fix in 13 months, or a mixture of some or all of the above. But I'm here now on my own...except for my ever-present friends, Sally Sertraline, Kerry Quetiapine and Pedro Propranolol.

But I'm not on my own, am I? I've got my blog/journal that might serve as the recipient of the multitude of memories stored in my pre-frontal cortex that tend to tumble out like tangled jumpers from an overstuffed wardrobe. Maybe this will help rearrange them tidily, fold them up, put them in my hippocampus, and slam the fucking door shut. This, my friends, is cod psychotherapy about to be performed by a mental defective. Stay tuned for fun and games.

The plan, then...it's to relive the incidents that cause intrusion through the written form without reference to persons living or dead. The fact that no one reads this blog anymore will ensure freedom from sensationalism. Or I could enable the settings so that only I can see the blog. While that will surely maintain security, I really will be talking to myself. Again. I'm not sure how I feel about such confirmation of insanity. We'll see.

OK...in the next instalment of the Cockney version of 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' we're going back to 1999.

I am a Breathing Time Machine

I'm in the gym in East Kilbride. My journey from a Fire Brigade Station Officer in south London to a dedicated gym-goer near Glasgow is a story in itself; one of retirement, relocation and a spiralled journey into darkness. Let's see how we get on with this return to blogging, or 'journaling' as it's more commonly referred to in the therapy sphere, and maybe we'll shine a light into that darkness. Maybe.

So, anyway, I'm in the gym in East Kilbride; I'm kitted out in the type of clobber you might expect a dedicated gym-goer to be clad in. Should I admit to wearing a fucking baseball cap indoors...in a temperature-controlled gym? I'm not sure I'm ready for that level of honesty yet. Maybe we'll get there. Maybe.

I've just completed the third set of five squats with an Olympic bar totalling 100kg. My mind, very unusually, is quiet. The normal chaos that whirls around my brain is absent. This is one of the reasons I've become a swollen, protein shake chugging gym-goer rather than a skeletal ultra-marathon runner; the gym and hard, explosive, physical exercise quietens the chaos in my head in a way that running never did. An 18-month engagement with sciatica that left me broken and hobbling encouraged a departure from the sport of putting one foot in front of the other quickly, right enough. But I was never any good at it anyway. But weight training? I can dig that. It's generally done indoors, in the warm, with barely clad women training alongside you. So I ask, what's not to like?

Then the oh so familiar smell reaches my nostrils. The one you get following a fire; the one that I smelled every day at work for over 27 years. The one that told so many stories of devastation, destruction, pain and loss. On this occasion, the odour emanates from a recently extinguished bin fire outside. But a quiet, imaginatively fertile mind, and a familiar, very evocative smell are like welcoming hosts to an event of four years previous and some four hundred miles away. A flashback, some people call this event.

I'm not in a gym in East Kilbride clad in gym gear and maybe (maybe) a baseball cap. I'm in a tower block in west London clad in the orange of an Urban Search and Rescue operative and Drager full-face respirator. The smell of fire is in my nostrils despite the facial protection. My colleague and I are performing a task that we just need to get done. It's not a pleasant task. And I suppose this is the bit where blogging (journaling) about this type of thing becomes difficult. I was never asked to sign a contract confirming the experiences of individuals in death remain between myself and that person (and possibly the coroner) but I metaphorically signed one nonetheless. So excuse my reticence to detail. But my colleague is about to commit himself to a strategy I believe is unnecessary: if we take a little bit longer, and expose ourselves to this unpleasantness for a few minutes more, we can get the task done gently and with dignity. So through the muffled confines of a Drager facemask, in a building that's creaking and groaning loudly as if remaining upright is a huge effort, I shout 'NO!' very loudly.

But, of course, I'm not in a tower block in west London. I'm in the gym in East Kilbride, and the experience of a middle-aged gym-goer, lost in himself, staring into the middle distance, then shouting 'NO!' in the echo reverberating walls of a gym, is a disconcerting event for other gym-goers.

I return to myself. I realise what has happened. Others are looking at me with concern or amusement. I'm breathing heavily and shaking slightly but mostly I'm fucking embarrassed. I tell myself that this will all be forgotten in a few minutes and go back to the Olympic bar. But the side glances and sniggers tell me otherwise. This will be the chat around the water cooler; the mad bloke in the gym; the Cockney guy that talks to himself.

I make a mental note to record this event on my weekly 'Invasive Thoughts Diary' that I have to send to my therapist in advance of our weekly meeting by Zoom. The meetings where I've had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder explained to me. The meetings where the condition all makes so much sense but requires a multitude of prescription medications to manage it.

If I wear a different coloured baseball cap (maybe) and some different clobber at my next gym visit, maybe I won't be recognised as 'the mad bloke down the gym.'

Maybe.

Raising Lazarus at the River Ayr Way

After a Gobi Desert type dry spell in the ultra marathon world; and after a disappointing DNF in the West Highland Way, I thought I'd end this season with a bit of a gimme at the River Ayr Way.

Now let's get this right, RAW is still 40 miles, and anyone equating water only flowing downhill with a coasting from start to finish is in for a bit of a kick in the bollocks, but I've done this race four or five times before (I'm sorry, I can't be precise because I don't keep a log of races I've run. I tried keeping a training diary once but the plethora of blank pages months after its beginning preyed upon my mind like Marley's ghost, so I threw it out), always with minimal training, and always achieved a finish (except the time I couldn't be arsed so went to the pub after 10 miles).

My training for this year's effort included three of four gym sessions a week with a blast on the treadmill and one 13 mile off-roader about a month ago. The gallus, over-confident side of my brain told me the 70 miles of WHW in June was enough to get me the 40 miles from Glenbuck to Ayr; its opposing sensible, cautious side did it's usual and remained as mute as a church mouse. Let's just say I'm gonna give the latter mentioned hemisphere a good slap and tell it to speak up in future.

Anyway, the day of the race arrives and Mrs Mac and I are in the little car park in Glenbuck surrounded by 80 or so others. There's a bit of an air of excitement, this being the 10th anniversary race, and folk are chatting happily. I say hi to a couple of runners I know but the vast majority are strangers- testament to the fact that ultra marathon running in Scotland has widened its appeal...or that's just a really pompous, self important belief simply because nearly 80 people have never encountered an ageing tattooed, Londoner on the start line of a race.

Somewhere in the glove box of the car is my race plan that I scribbled down on a used envelope the night before. I reckon I can comfortably average 10 minute miles for 10 miles, then each 10 mile section add a minute which will get me home for a sub 8 hour PB. Piece of piss.

The race starts and my pacing is perfect. I'm happily tripping along, listening to my music, in my Hokas.

Yes, you read that right....in my Hokas.

Having launched an online campaign a few years ago against the bumper car-like monstrosities, and anyone that wore them, I'd gone and bought a pair in the hope they might be kind to the calf that I tore in April. I wore them briefly in the West Highland Way, coupled with a pair of gaiters, and they gave me blisters on my insteps. I blamed the gaiters.

Seven miles into this race, sans gaiters, the familiar soreness at my insteps indicate the gaiters are not the villain of this piece. It's those ridiculously clumpy, stupid looking breeze-block-cum-trainers. The soreness becomes full on blisters and the blisters burst and weep serum into my socks.

Thankfully Mrs Mac is waiting dutifully for me at the shoogly bridge, just past checkpoint one, so I dump the Frankenstein's monster footwear and don my reliable Inov-8s.

Off again enjoying the extra minute per mile I've allowed myself, I'm cruising along for a few miles when 'PING', my lower back siezes and sends signals of pain to my brain, which wakes up the sensible, cautious side, which then instructs: 'STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING!'

'FUCK OFF!' I reply, and keep going, but my stride is shortened to such an effect that those 11 minute miles are nothing but an unachievable aspiration and that scribbled race plan is catapulted spectacularly out of sight.

Sorn is a lovely little village about 17 miles into the route. The river runs through it, ducks quack and waddle about and there's a beautiful stone bridge where loving couples or families might picnic in the sun. On Saturday, however a dark cloud entered the village, limping along, swearing and cursing and demanding Ibuprofen (yes, I know the dangers of consuming NSAIDs during exercise but they're outweighed by the slagging one might get for another DNF).

Mrs Mac is there with a folding chair set up and feeds me a beef roll and coffee.

'Brufen' is all I can say.

I neck the little, red capsules of relief and set off walking, waiting for them to take effect. I realise that if they fail to improve matters, a DNF might be on the cards, as might a move to Antarctica where I can avoid any claims of blouse ownership and wuss-boy status.

Sometime later the pain subsides and I'm running again. Not exactly Lazarus from the dead, but to me a remarkable turnaround. The rest of the race is really just a hang on for the finish affair, but just to make things a little more difficult, a poorly parked car blocking a gate, a misinterpreted instruction, and an idiotic optimism that the wrong way will metamorphosise into the right way added an extra three miles to my travel.

To make the effort worthwhile, meeting Mrs Mac at Tarholm bridge, where eight years ago a fledgling romance was embarked upon as the River Ayr tumbled beneath our feet, sealed the deal. An encounter with old friends, Tim and Muriel Downie, and Tim's company over those last few miles reminded me of the good people you meet along the way. And my friend and colleague from London, Aldo Diana waiting for me at the finish secured the realisation that, actually it's all worth it.

But some training wouldn't go amiss.

So I got the gimme that so nearly wasn't such a gimme.  I also realised that my days of turning up to races having done minimal, if any,  training are probably over. This, I think, is due to two possibilities, or maybe both playing in tandem. The first is that I've probably drained the well of liberty taking as far as expecting my body to do extreme things without adequate preparation is concerned. The other is that in four months I will be 50 and maybe the  relentless march of time is having a negative effect. Or maybe both are giving me a two handed beat down in these increasingly grey and sparse years. Whatever it is I'll need to be more considerate in the future.

But finally I have to say that Tarholm Bridge, and the vision upon it, were as magical eight years on as they were in 2008.

Laters.

The Four Goblet Challenge

Well, it's true that we haven't been here for some time, folks. I suppose the creative activity of the written blog has been taken over by the soundbite simplicity of the micro-blog. Facebook, with its meandering posts, photo albums and quizzes- the other day, after allowing a Facebook app access to all my photographs, I discovered that the Hollywood actor I most resemble is Charlie Sheen (WINNING!). After smugly posting a self indulgent, soft focus picture of myself taken seven years ago alongside one of Charlie before he really smashed the granny out of cocaine and prostitutes, I discovered that a few of my mates were similarly compared to Charlie. Even my Jamaican pal, Radcliffe, my auntie Joan and my dog, Mason.

Anyway, in this rapidly changing landscape of the blog, Facebook was quickly relegated to second division by its limited-symbol, express-yourself-succinctly, bastard child Twitter. And just as I started to get the hang of that particular medium, and the reasons why perfectly sane individuals would post fuck all except a string of loosely associated words all preceded by a hashtag, along comes Snapchat. If you've yet to encounter this most modern phenomenon of the blog world, allow me to explain: it quite simply allows you to send a photograph from your mobile phone to a selected recipient, which is then viewable by that recipient for up to ten seconds before it disappears from existence like a politician's promise.

So, if you're following my rambling logic here, my blog has been out of action because the once creative art of sitting in front of a PC and developing a considered, word processed account of an important life event, then posting it to Blogger or Wordpress, has been rendered redundant by the ability to send a soon-to-expire picture of your cock to your burd.

But why this revival of Subversive Running? I hear you ask. 

Well, going back to its beginnings, the reason for the birth of Subversive Running was to diarise my 2006 journey toward the West Highland Way Race- a 35 hour, 95 mile expedition on foot from Milngavie to Fort William. It was also meant to be a foil to the plethora of boring, rather-gently-poach- my-testicles-in-simmering-vinegar-than-read -your- time-and-splits-obsessed-bollocks. In fact, my blog very quickly became nothing more than a rambling record of alcohol consumption, fighting with police dogs and of being verbally abused by horse riders on Epsom Downs, with zip about running. But its revival is to enable a return to its raison d'être....yes, that's right, I'm running the West Highland Way Race again.

I had a quick scan back to the blog report I wrote following my failed attempt of the race in 2013 and it's a sorry tale of pain, exhaustion and the violent expulsion of fecal matter in a field in Dumgoyne. Indeed, following that race I went on record to swear I would never run it again. 

If you care to look back at that report, entitled 'Bodily Movements in the West Highland Way Race,' and you access the comments section, some of those that contributed their thoughts said things like: 'Yeah, yeah..whatever. See you in 2015.'

Well, they were a year too early but they were right. I'm back.

I've tried to keep away from public statements of my intention to race, preferring to use Facebook to record pictures of baked goods and fanciful ideas that I have a passing resemblance to Charlie Sheen...viewed through the eyes of a partially sighted drunken geezer in a darkened room fifteen miles away. 

That policy came really good in April when I tore my left calf while running up a hill in a weight vest. It appeared then that the race was off and June would see me supporting my big, numb-skulled pal Martin Antoninus Horatio Hooper instead- and assisting him to acquire his fourth finisher's goblet so that he could Lord it all over me for at least the next twelve months.

But the God of calf repair smiled on me and said 'Son, if you're a good lad and you sit on your arse for five weeks I'll place you on the start line alongside your mate, Hooper.' And so he did.

So, I've managed a clutch of 20+ mile runs with two 70 mile weeks since early May and I've done everything I can to ensure as good a chance I can of a finish. But, Dear Reader, this is about more than just a finish. This is the Four Goblet Challenge.

Both Hooper and I have three finisher's goblets sitting on our shelves at home (well, I have two and a half. One of mine was involved in a red-wine-meets-the-sound-of-breaking-crystal event a couple of years ago) and this is the quest for goblet number four.

Before I go off to stretch my hamstrings, bake some bread and do a quiz that tells me I resemble Brad Pitt (or maybe that should be Brad Pitt's arse) I'll leave you with a discussion Hooper and I had while running together last week:

'Here, Mart, you see if we're running this year's race and we've battled valiantly over Conic Hill, scrambled along Loch Lomond and suffered over Rannoch Moor?'

'Yeah, what about it?'

'And then we've stomped together up the Devil's Staircase, seen the sun rise on the Lairig Mhor and then hit the road into Fort Wiliam?'

'Yeah,' replies Hooper, warming to the romantic notion of shared pain and suffering and impending brotherly glory.

'Well, in instances such as that I've seen athletes join hands over the final yards and finish together in a beautiful, sporting display of togetherness.'

'Lovely idea, Dave, I can picture it now,' says Hooper, dreamily.

'Well, the thing is, I can sprint faster than you so you can fuck right off if you think that's happening.'

Laters.