A foot massage

In my last blog entry I mentioned that I hadn't actually done any barefoot running since being in Alicante over two and a half months ago, and that the last time I walked barefoot was over a month ago and had to stop because the ground was too harsh on my feet.

Well, I'm going to deviate a bit now.  I just wanted to set the scene, before I would go on.

I've started a very, very healthy routine with my flatmate of getting up at 5am every day.  Whoever is up first knocks on the door of the other, and then we both do our respective spiritual routines.  My plan has been to go for a barefoot run after I've finished my morning meditation every morning, but upto today this has not happened purely because I've felt too tired.  And then, so the plan goes, I have breakfast after the run, then either leave out to uni or get on with some work or go back to bed for a while.  The important bit is actually making the disciplined effort of rising at 5am, no matter how stubborn I'm feeling towards staying in my bed and my dreams.

Today I managed to kickstart my barefoot training!  And my, did it feel good to get into it.

I thought I would just go for a walk down to Moorland Road from my flat on Hillside Road, and walk back again.  Ya know, just so that I can carefully place the tips of my toes in the water, so that I can get a feel of its temperature.

I noticed a few things in the first half of the walk, whilst I was walking down to Moorland Road.  Firstly, 7am is such a special time!  It is before anyone has really got up and started the day, but there are still a few people about.  It felt very atmospheric to me.  Oh, and the sky was really quite something.  It was pretty sunny, but there was a layer of dark clouds that looked like they were about to come over (and they have since been over, about an hour later).  The birds were at band practice.  The temperature was actually fairly mild, though my feet were feeling very cold on the slightly damp pavement.
I noticed, straight away after leaving out, how completely different of a sensation it is to be walking barefoot.  I can actually feel my weight moving on and off of the ground when I'm barefoot, as I can feel the after-shock/vibration of every footstep.  I guess shoes normally absorb this all.  So leading back to the last entry that I did, where I linked to this article here: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100127134241.htm in saying about the different kind of stride that you're supposed to have when being barefoot because of how much more uncomfortable it is to walk with the heel hitting the ground, I can clarify that in my experience I very much agree with this finding.  I don't know if it's like it every day (it certainly wasn't quite like this in Alicante), but today the pavement seemed so spiky and hard!  It was actually quite painful to walk until I started walking on the balls of my feet, and then I felt a lot bouncier (as the article suggested I would), and I found that I was walking very very quietly, like as if almost all impact of my steps had disappeared after I stopped walking on my heels.

Now, what about this ball of the foot?  Why is it called the ball of the foot?  Won't I do damage to it by walking on it?  Well, as for its origins, it is named after the largest metatarsal bone which has a ball-like appearance.  Interesting huh?  It's been used in this way since the mid-1300s.  And as for the damage, we'll see.  I'll let you know if anything happens.  But it has not happened in my experience so far with being barefoot, and I don't honestly expect it to happen in the future.  Also, I would regard the possible injuries to my feet to be much less serious compared to the injuries I have already experienced with my hips from playing badminton, from cycling, and from running badly.

I got to Moorland Road, and then walked round Triangle North, so that I could do a loop and go up Junction Road.  But, quite unexpectedly, I started running just before I got onto Junction Road.  It wasn't even raining or anything, I just felt completely like running.  Sure, my feet were cold and I was deliberately twitching my toes quite a lot so that blood kept circulating in them (I'm paranoid about getting frostbite in above-zero temperature...how embarassing it would be!), and I didn't have any speed about me because I wasn't used to either running or going barefoot, but there was a really nice feeling that I got of moving my body in this way.  It was really really relaxing, just bouncing away up the hills.
And then, to make things even more interesting, I started needing to run.  My bladder had become a little upset by the fact that I'd decided I didn't need to go to the loo between waking up and going for the run.  So I started to run faster, and more urgently.  But it still felt peaceful and relaxing.
I became surprised by how warm I had become - even though I wasn't actually running with much speed at all despite my latter urgency, I had picked up a sweat very quickly.  Next time, I decided, I won't go out with all the layers on.

So I returned home, sorted myself out (including, very importantly, washing my feet.  This avoids any awkward confrontations with either my housemate or anyone else who see me barefooted and notice the cleanliness of my feet...), and had my well-earned breakfast.  A very good start to the day.

And the best part of it all: the feeling after sitting down.  My feet tingling, and feeling smooth.  They had just received an unorthodox massage, but a massage regardless.  Completely for free.

So if anyone would like a foot massage, I would suggest you join me on my early morning barefoot run.

And for an inspiring video of this guy winning the 1960 Rome Olympics marathon (he was completely unheard of previously) without wearing shoes, see: http://youtu.be/0Dppdcy1pyM?t=5m55s