micke-midlife on January 1st, 2009

happy new year to all you runners, dads, mums, and other readers out there. it won’t get easy with the financial crisis affecting the real economy resulting in job losses in many industries, with new wars breaking out and old ones not ceasing to exist and even more countries going nuclear, with attention and determination shifting away from fighting the climate change (perhaps towards seeking to understand how to live with it) and of course as the economist wrote with the farewell to youth in the rich world: Kate Blanchett, Jennifer Lopez, Renee Zellweger, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Jennifer Aniston all turn 40 this year (as does the median age of the seven big, rich G7 democracies Japan, Italy, Germany, Britian, France, Canada and the US, with the US being the youngest at 36,4 years because of their southern friends that come and keep California clean)

but as we speak about it, isn’t 40 the new 30? the forties will become media sexy and the age attention span will expand. the marathon being at the forefront of course. the men world record was set by haile gebreselassie at the age of 35 in berlin last year. and on the female side, irina mikitenko from nowadays germany won the world marathon majors - a sum of the races in boston, london, berlin, chicago and new york - at the age of 36 in 2008 as well.

a contrast to all those challenges ahead of us was the scenery outside helsinki windows today. it looked bright, sunshine all over the place and a winter frozen cold scenery was opening up calm and inviting for an easy 11km stroll to burn away the rest of the calories from the night before, get a rush of oxygen to the head and be at peace with the world for a day. join in on some particular nice impressions.