With Valentine’s Day approaching I am reminded of a contrarian comedian who once remarked that he doesn’t “do Valentine’s Day” because his expressions of love are not dictated by a random date on a calendar. I get that. Sure it’s a bit of fun for some, but there are those who would be offended if their partner omitted, on the fated fourteenth day of the second month, to make some declaratory gesture of affection. This is how random the motivation seems to me:
“It’s Valentine’s so I booked us a table at that new swanky Italian. We should go out tonight and spend some quality time together, like we used to. I know it’s last minute and I know it’s a work night but it’ll be great……..
What’s that?… It’s the 13th today!? Oh no, geez, of course, no wonder I got the reservation so easily!
Ok, no issue, my bad, I’ll fix this, I’ll see if we can get the reservation changed to tomorrow; no really, it’s ok, tomorrow is good, we don’t have to go tonight, tomorrow’s better, it’s Valentine’s…….we should do this tomorrow, on the right day.”
Manufacturing the optimum conditions for romance to blossom, like planning a special evening out, should be a personal pursuit undertaken to the ticking of your own clock. By contrast, joining the throngs of couples seated at countless restaurants on a pre-manufactured communal calendar date to dutifully mark affection has always struck me as about as personalized as a Unification Church mass wedding.
This notion of manufacturing communal emotion on cue leads me, perhaps inelegantly, to the Color Run which I took part in a few weeks back.
This annual event is billed as “The Happiest 5k on the Planet”. What that means is that organizers throw coloured powder on the runners at intervals. That’s what turns a 5k into The Happiest 5k.
But my tank of joy is running low as I line up at the start (sorry, I mean the “launch chute”) with thousands of others waiting, for over an hour, for my tranche of runners to be released (think London underground commuter peak hour, queuing up at Victoria station because there’s a bottleneck at the turnstiles…now imagine you’re wearing fluorescent-framed sunglasses and trying to enjoy the whole thing).
A DJ-like announcer gamely tries to maintain the energy and keep the trapped herd whooping and hollering. My mind wanders to Pink Floyd at Earl’s Court, 1980: Roger Waters brilliantly imitating a dictatorial, Big Brother-State commandant, angrily exhorting the audience, becoming increasingly exasperated: “Let’s all have a clap!! Come on, I can’t hear you!! Put your hands together!! Have a good time!! Enjoy yourselves!!!”
Indeed the song which Mr. Waters’ rant segues into – Run Like Hell – might have been appropriate here were it not for the fact that each wave of participants is launched into a … walk. Eighty percent of the crowd is walking all the way – not even brisk walking, just ambling-in-the-local-park-on-a-Sunday-morning-killing-time-before-lunch walking. If this “run” were down a High Street, there would be plenty of window-shopping going on.
The route is a depressingly utilitarian set of loops in and around some building service areas and car parks. I know I’ve been instructed to be happy, and I’m here voluntarily after all, but I’m getting serious Emperor’s New Clothes vibes. At one point I remark solemnly to my colleague “I hate to break it to you, but, how can I put this? …..We’re walking, through an indoor multi-storey car park – and we paid to do this.”
Now, I’m all for pragmatism, but The Happiest 5k On The Planet at one point resembles a snaking queue at airport immigration. My GPS app tracker shows that the route looks like a child’s drawing of someone’s intestinal tract (still inside the body, that is). It all feels as unimaginative as setting up a tent in your back garden and claiming it is “camping”. Adding to the general sense of laziness, the route finishes after exactly 4.2K (I suggest at the time that we claim back 16% of the entrance fee).
When you’re manufacturing communal joy, especially for a tidy profit, then your Happy factory needs to be slick. But here we see the seams, the cogs and wheels grinding, the Wizard of Oz lazily pulling levers behind the curtain.
A few days later, I get an email with a feedback survey. I’m tempted to suggest that the tagline be changed from “The Color Run: The Happiest 5K on the Planet” to “The Color Amble: A Generally Agreeable 4.2K in your Area”.
The Color Run may not be for me, but it clearly has appeal. I think the organizers should double-down next year and hold it on Valentine’s Day. They could call it “The Happiest AND Most Amorous 5K on the Planet”. Organizers could hand out single stem roses (for a fee) for runners to clutch between their teeth as they run the happy gauntlet of the powder showers. And of course there would be no issue with getting everyone in the mood: after all, it will be the fourteenth, yes the fourteenth, day of February! (If that isn’t enough, I hear Roger Waters is available as a compere for a reasonable price.)