Reruns of life

After some fairly inactive months in which my focus was in the wrong place, I'm now focusing on me. With this comes the importance of my health. All around health is important, and I think that I forgot that for a little while. You can't choose your family unless you're adopting family members, but you can choose your friends and choosing the wrong ones is a waste of time. It is important to choose them wisely, rather than settling for the first people you meet. With this realisation comes the inclination to return to the positive decision I made almost a year ago: get more active and get outside.

So, the running has once again begun. I must say, since I have begun running again I feel much better all around. The fresh air does me good, and the exercise does as well. There is definitely no reason for me not to continue running. While out today, I was thinking about when I stopped running in the fall. I know that a big part of it was connected to how I was feeling when I came down with a really bad cold. Then once I moved into the busiest part of town I didn't have a route that wasn't full of people. I could go on, and then point out that as time passed and winter started, it was just too cold. Realistically though, winter here is not that cold. Most of the time there was no snow or ice on the group on the weekends. I could have easily gone running every Saturday or Sunday, but I didn't because I was focusing on the wrong things.

 I've gone three weeks in a row and I'm extremely proud of myself. I haven't settled on a route yet, but going for a run Saturday morning is a great way to explore parts of town that I haven't discovered yet. Running here is a lot like running back home. There are hills just everywhere here. In fact, so far I'm finding that if you want to do a 5k run without having to run in tiny circular routes several times during one run, then you can not avoid hills. I think that I'm in better shape now for it. I'm almost seeking out hills in order to push myself harder.

Speaking of being in better shape, I was in better shape than I thought I would be. My first weekend back into running I thought would be hard, really hard. But it actually wasn't so bad. I managed to run in intervals of ten and one (one being the walking). I couldn't believe it! I was incredibly impressed and it is a really great feeling to know that after almost six months of not running that I was able to just back into the activity without an excessive amount of difficulty.

A happy discovery on today's run.

The man himself: Mr. Lister 

                                         

Must be spring, the daffodils and crocuses are starting to grow!

View from where I entered the park. 

Today on my run, I became a bit sad as I was running up a hill. This was a fairly steep hill and it reminded me of some of the hills that I used to run in back home. Following the train of thought, then I started to miss my favourite park to run in back home. After I reached the top of the hill I was pleasantly surprised. Across the street from where I stood was a park. It was a decent size and I decided to explore it. There are different areas in this park, including a botanical gardens and an art gallery. There is also a sports section to the park but I found that bit less interesting. I decided to run through the botanical gardens since the idea of it reminded me of my grandparents.

Botanical garden's waterfall. 

Pathway in Lister Park. Great place to run.

Even though it's just the beginning of spring here, and the weather has been quite dreary, I found the gardens quite beautiful. The park was beautiful in fact. After leaving the gardens, I discovered that this park also as an Art Gallery. Out front of this gallery there is a giant rabbit and another sculpture as well. I am not too sure that the other giant sculpture was. But it was quite large.

Art gallery inside this random park. Well I know that the park was planned and not random, it's only since I didn't know that the park was there that I think it is random. 

Giant rabbit sculpture

Piece of art outside the art gallery. 

The art gallery wasn't open when I was there this morning. It doesn't open until 11 on Saturdays. I didn't feel like standing around waiting for the gallery to open, so I will have to go back at another time to see the gallery.

Now I know this park is there, I may make it part of my running route. Yet, on the other hand, I have been enjoying discovering a new route each week. Only time will tell.