Running for nothing – how I found myself out of action
I could hardly sleep. I tossed and turned and tossed and turned some more. My joints, especially the leg joints on the thigh, knee and heel were aching. Any folding of either of my legs brought about an intense pain in the of my body. I was shivering, despite the usually cold night that I was already used to and should not have elicited such a reaction. I was clothed in a trouser, a T-shirt, a pullover and a jacket, then covered in three layers of sheet, blanket and fleece, but I was still feeling cold. I had a headache from afar, though it kept getting intense towards my forehead with every passing minute.
“What is happening to me?,” I found myself speaking out loud, in the dead of the night.
It was quiet. Not even the night crickets made a noise on this night. I could hear my own breathing and heartbeat, meaning that it was that still. The bed creaked as I turned, only to be uncomfortable in that turn, hence being forced to turn again, as the bed creak again. Every turn hurt my joints and intensified the headache. Every turn put me in a more uncomfortable position than the previous.
“What is happening to me?,” I asked the still night for a second time in less than a minute, as I got up and sat on the bed, the cold of being outside the beddings hitting me with vengeance. I retreated to the bed to toss and turn some more. I kept listening to the quiet night even as I kept turning every minute due to the discomfort of my aching joints.
I could not take it anymore and found myself awake at some point in the night. I had so far just heard of a cock crow, somewhere in the distance of the silent night. That was the only sound on this night. I stepped out of bed, the cold contrast from the warm bedding hitting me badly. I went to the washrooms and stood by the mirror, to confirm that I was still me. I was still me, alright. I looked haggard and completely beat.
I went back towards the bed and switched on the computer and monitor. It made the buzzing sound as the fan on the CPU rotated around. Usually this noise would be indiscernible, today it sounded so loud in the still of the night. I checked the time on the lower right corner of the now lit monitor. The light illuminating the full extent of the room due to the once still darkness. It was just about 4.00am.
I turned on an online news channel for a lack of a better thing to do. Sleep was now out of the question. I just wanted to spend my time standing around, but the chill of the environment was becoming unbearable. I went back to bed and glanced at the monitor, my eyes aching, as the forehead headache resisted the rays from the screen. I closed my eyes and listened on to the announcer, the war in Gaza dominating the headlines, then the US presidential campaigns and debate, and inevitably, the demonstrations in Kenya. That last one got me opening my eyes, as they highlighted the Tuesday demonstrations of July 9, just yesterday, leading to this night that I hardly survived due to this shiver and headache.
I believe that I must have fallen asleep for some minutes as some point in the morning, since I would become cognizant of the ongoing news stories once more at around seven in the morning, when most of the news were once again being repeated. It is also at this point that I gave up on staying in bed and started planning on what to do next.
I left the house at about nine on this Wednesday. I did not have an appetite for anything, and so just left the house, not even having taken a sip of water. Accompanied by the junior runner, we walked the 1.7km road that is under construction to the main Dagoretti road. I registered one of personal worst times in this walk, where I would usually average 10min per km, and registered a pathetic 15min per km. My steps ached and I was even glad that I had made it to the main road in one piece.
This stretch of road under construction remained an eyesore. It has been under construction since February, only to be abandoned from April to early June due to the unrelenting rains. We had suffered the mud and impassibility of that road in all that period. The road construction crew was now back and were layering it up with yet another level of soil, but we were not holding our breaths on this road being completed any time soon, dust and mud notwithstanding.
We got a matatu at Jambu stage, where Thigi Thigi junction butchery is located. The very TT junction that would later entice us with intense incense of roast meat, but even then, I would not feel anything due to my lost appetite, but back to the present, I was eagerly waiting for a matatu. We soon got in and started the drive. Hardly two hundred metres on and the matatu came to a screech as the makanga hit the side panel loudly to beckon the driver to stop. We stopped smack in the middle of the road as the makanga jumped out of the still moving matatu. A lorry that was just approaching from behind hooted deafeningly as it overtook us, the force of its motion almost shaking the matatu. The matatu then started reversing fast, but not for long….
“Wowi, Ngai!,” we heard a scream from outside as the matatu came to an abrupt stop and we heard a bang.
We were a bit confused as to what was happening. We peered around in all directions, trying to discern what could be going on. We could see some woman somewhere in front of the vehicle, besides the road, exclaiming while kind of closing her mouth, a gesture of fear and danger. It took us time to figure out what was going on.
“Unakanyaga conductor?,” the woman approached the matatu, even as the once-upon-a-time makanga emerged from somewhere behind the matatu, trying to walk straight.
The woman got into the matatu and went straight to give the driver a piece of her mind, “Yani dereva, wewe unaweza tu gonga conductor?,” then she turned back to face the conductor, who was now back to the door, just about to close it, “Umeumia?”
The makanga just shrugged off the conversation and gestured an OK to the driver and soon we were zooming off towards Gichuru Secondary School. The makanga would eventually disembark at Gikambura with a slight limp, even as the driver handed back the matatu to the driver, and the makanga handed back the reins to the makanga. It seemed like we were operating with a bonoko driver and a bonoko makanga, but that is our life. We did not have time to even digest the going-ons before we were forced to sit four people on every row of seats, instead of the usual three. That is the norm on this route and the only surprise was that I was surprised that this was happening even off the rush hour of the morning and evening.
We made another slow walk from Kikuyu stage to Aga Khan clinic somewhere within Kikuyu town. I got my token number and awaited my turn to be attended to. My head was still aching and I was by now shivering like a leaf. I was finally called for registration then to the triage about thirty minutes later. The thermometer must have lit red, since the nurse ushered me immediately to the chemist to get a 500mg paracetamol tablet, the one that is dissolves in water. I dissolved it and let it fizzle out to completion in about five minutes. I took the saline solution. It tasted bad, but I drained it all. It seemed to work, since some ten minutes later, and I was now feeling the expected room temperatures and even managed to remove my two layers of jacket.
It would be another hour before I could face the doc, another thirty minutes before I would get the bloodworks for the initial tests, and yet another hour before I was to get another plebo encounter for a malaria test.
Remember that Thigi Thigi story? I would once again be back to this junction alighting from a matatu from Kikuyu at around two in the afternoon. The whiff of nyama choma was by this time blanketing the whole road junction, but unfortunately, I felt nothing of it. By this time I had regained my step and was feeling generally good, though I still felt the headache, but the joint pains had subsided significantly. I was also holding a 2-day sick off sheet at hand and was eagerly waiting to get home so that I could take a nap, having missed a whole night sleep the night before.
The feeling last night was worse than the feeling I had as I did one of my worst runs a few days ago, on July 1. On that day I almost did not finish the 24km run, due to how my body had almost given up on me. I however, soldered on and did a 5min 44sec average, recording one of my worst times in the history of the distance, but just glad to have lived to tell the tale. I have not had a run since. Coincidentally, that run was supposed to be the monthly run, aka June international marathon, that I was forced to do in July, since June was full of demos and uncertainties.
“They did not give you any medicine?,” the junior runner would finally ask when we got home, when she realized that I had nothing to show for my trip to Aga Khan.
“Nothing was found, not even malaria. The doc told me to take a rest and have a review on Friday.”
She was as just as perplexed as I was, having witnessed my suffering for the last eight hours. I had to chip into the mystery as were of reassuring her that all was fine.
“Remember that Monday rain? The one that I told you about?”
“Yes, I remember. You got home soaked wet”
“Yes, that one. That was the source of all my problems!”
And, who can forget that Monday rain? The one that rained just as I disembarked from the bus after duty. I had been rained on like never before in my life! The subsequent evening travel from Thogoto to Jambu on that day had been misery, as I survived a fully packed matatu, four people per row, all mostly shivering in soaked clothes as it continued to rain outside. I did not know that it would come to this. Come to nothing! Not even a tablet!
WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, July 19, 2024
