Ice hazard!

I am, as I have written on here before, not much good on snow and ice. Even when I was younger - and my centre of gravity was considerably lower - I found that attempts at roller-skating and then skateboarding were foiled by an inability to stay upright. Whilst other children would skateboard home from school, it was all I could manage to ride awkwardly for thirty yards while the board travelled down a slight incline near my house, and never so fast that I couldn't simply jump off.

As I got older I managed to stay upright by the simple expedient of not standing on anything that wasn't fixed in place. Occasional teenage forays onto ice-rinks provided timely reminders that puberty had not brought a longed for sense of balance and the girls I might have hoped to impress would glide past me, oblivious, as I attempted to look casual whilst hanging grimly onto the barrier that surrounded the rink. From time to time, as I teetered gamely out onto the ice, people would whizz past me skating backwards, which seemed so thoroughly surreal that I thought - and hoped - I might be dreaming.

These days, my poor sense of balance still manifests itself primarily during icy weather. A couple of Christmases ago, I fell over four times. Last year wasn't bad; just one tumble as I carefully made my way across a patch of ice that I encountered while out running. This year, I haven't fallen over once. Then again, there hasn't been much opportunity so far. 

This afternoon, the Minx dropped me off about eight miles from home so that I could run back. Despite the low temperatures, the roads we drove along were clear of ice and the only thing that delayed my exit from the car was the fact that the heater was on and it was a bit nippy outside. However, I'd only run about a quarter of a mile when I encountered the first patch of ice. There was no question of turning back - I couldn't run home along the main road - so I soldiered on reluctantly and with a kind of physical fear that anticipated that brief moment of weightlessness before a jarring impact (that for some reason manifests partly but strongly in my nose, no matter which bit of me I actually land on).

The stretch in the photo wasn't too bad as the sun had reached the edge of the road, creating a ribbon of tarmac upon which a tall, unsteady chap could run with some confidence. On other stretches, the road was covered with frost and ice, and I ran up the middle, my feet striking the ground like the fingers of an inexpert typist. Thankfully, after three miles or so, I was back on a proper road and I was able to enjoy the long run down into Kirkby Lonsdale and, more importantly, the comfortingly nailed down floor in the cottage.