Frances Whiting: I keep getting hurt during my ‘guilty pleasure’

Despite the wishes of my family and friends, I’ve once again taken up my ‘guilty pleasure’ even though I keep getting hurt, writes Frances Whiting.

What’s your guilty pleasure, apart from Bridgerton, that is.

Now Bridgerton is apparently many people’s guilty pleasure - it’s Netflix’s most successful series to date.

But if you are one of the few who haven’t seen it, Bridgerton is basically a period drama set in England’s Regency period which largely revolves around the lives of debutants trying to snare a husband.

Apparently in those days there was a pretty slim window for young women to become betrothed, and if you didn’t manage to tie a husband down during hunting season, you were destined to a terrible life mostly spent travelling in a carriage with some impoverished relative who hated you as a companion.

Phoebe Dynevor and Ruth Gemmel in Bridgerton. Picture: Liam Daniel/Netflix

And the reason it has become such a guilty pleasure to many women - myself included - is that while we should all be outraged by the misogynistic indignities all the women in Bridgerton suffer, it turns out we can look the other way as long it’s to glimpse the Duke of Hastings strutting around the Square in his breeches.

Anyway, I digress - my guilty pleasure is running.

I know, it’s not very sexy, is it? Not very the Duke and Daphne on the old staircase, but there it is.

Or rather, there I am, running again despite, as my friends and family know, my proclivity for falling over whilst doing it.

I have dislocated a shoulder while running, I have broken my arm in four places, I have smashed my face badly and I have sprained both ankles.

It sounds like fun, doesn’t it! You can see why I do it.

But the thing is after months of not doing, mostly because my family banned me, I’m out there again.

The question is why?

Columnist Frances Whiting. Picture: Mark Cranitch.

I’ve thought about this, why would I do an activity that for me at least seems to come with a fairly high risk factor?

And it occurs to me it’s because every now and again we all need to do things just for the hell of it.

Not because it’s low risk, not because it’s expected of us, or because we need the money, or because we’re trying to reach a goal, or better ourselves in some way.

Not for self improvement, or to try to make ourselves look better, or because we’re trying to pull ourselves together or push ourselves out of our comfort zones.

No, not for any of those things.

The reason I like running might be for the same reason you like gardening, or doing crosswords, or hiking or singing or bird watching or rock climbing or sitting on the couch, or whatever it is that you like to do.

Maybe the very reason why I like it is because there isn’t any reason behind it.

I do it for the hell of it. I do it because I like the sound my feet make when they hit the pavement. I do it because for those twenty or so minutes (look, I didn’t say I was a good runner, I just said I was a runner) I haul my body around the blocks, I don’t ask anything of myself or others, and that’s enough.

And I’m enough - I’m not aiming for a PB, or to train for a half marathon, I’m aiming to enjoy the sunshine, watch the world in motion around me, and listen to a bird song or two.

I hope that you have something you do just for the hell of it too - something that’s just enough for you.

I’M LOVING:
The readers of this column who never cease to astound me with their generosity and support. This week a special shout out to Catherine who sent me three, mint condition Dolly magazines from 1980 after I mentioned how much I loved this dearly departed magazine. Thank you Catherine, you made my day!