It was a weekday morning. Since turning fifty, I’d become conscious of my declining stamina and made it a point to run at least a few times a week. Of course, “for my health” was just the excuse; deep down, it was rooted in a strangely youthful pride—a desire to remain someone who could still run.
My family was still asleep. In the quiet morning air, I laced up my running shoes. The temperature was low, the sky a faint blue. This kind of air has a dangerous charm that somehow makes you think, “I can do it today.”
I started running slowly, passing through residential areas and circling a few parks. I felt fine. Light, even.
“I could probably run a bit extra today.”
That was the problem – that casual thought popped into my head. When people feel good, they tend to overestimate themselves. Probably half the failures in the world happen because of this “I feel like I can do it” feeling.
And then, just after passing the turnaround point, as I reached the area farthest from home.
——CRACK!!
A sharp pain shot through the outside of my left knee.
“…!”
A soundless cry escaped me. The shock was so intense my legs stopped, and I could only stand frozen in place.
The pain felt like an electric shock.
Not figuratively—I genuinely thought, “Did I touch a live wire?” It even felt like my heart had stopped for an instant.
I frantically scanned my surroundings, trying to cover it up with nonsensical actions, but a commuting salaryman spoke to me.
“Are you okay?”
“Um… my knee… it just… snapped…”
“Snap…?”
“Ah, sorry, that was a clumsy way to describe it.”
“No, it’s… take care…”
I was completely treated like a weirdo. I was serious, but it didn’t register with him. This was the “misunderstood laughter.” Life sometimes throws in this kind of cruel humor.
When I tried to walk, the pain shot in a different direction.
With every step forward, regret washed over me like a wave: “Why now?” Of all places, it had to break down at the farthest point. It was enough to make me want to collect statistics on life’s terrible timing.
After walking a bit, I passed a group of elementary school kids walking to school.
One boy saw my awkward gait and whispered to his friend:
“Look, that guy looks like a zombie from a movie.”
“No, it’s not like that… He’s actually really serious…”
But my words drifted away on the wind, never reaching the children.
“Practicing to be a zombie? For the school festival?”
No, I’ve never practiced being a zombie in my life. I don’t recall ever taking on that kind of role.
Finally reaching home, I struggled to take off my shoes at the entrance when my wife, Misaki, woke up.
“What’s wrong? You look like you’re dead tired…”
“My knee… it suddenly started hurting when I turned back…”
“Turning back… I wish it had hurt closer to home.”
“If I could do that, I wouldn’t be in this mess…”
My wife laughed a little and showed concern, but our conversation was slightly out of sync. This too was a smile born of a misunderstanding. The person involved is serious; those around them have a slightly skewed understanding. That’s just how family life is.
Even past noon, the pain wouldn’t subside. Sitting at my computer working, I typed in one forbidden search term after another.
“Knee excruciating pain outer side” “Running can’t walk” “50s knee done for”
The search results were basically all despair-inducing. The more I read, the darker my mood grew. The darkness of online medical information runs deep.
A chat came in from my coworker, Kitagawa.
“Hey, boss! You were running this morning! That’s awesome!”
“Nah, my knee… might be broken.”
“Huh? That’s a metaphor, right?”
“Physically, maybe…”
“Haha, you’re in a great mood today!”
I was dead serious, but he treated it like a complete joke.
I thought to myself.
“In life, the things that matter most are the hardest to convey.”
While continuing work, tossed by waves of gloom and pain, a single word jumped out at me from my phone’s ad section.
“Improve Knee Pain with Regenerative Medicine – What is PRP Treatment?”
PRP?
What’s that?
My first thought was “A new kind of yogurt?” – a completely off-base image. Human imagination is surprisingly useless.
Yet this was the first “touchpoint” that would change the course of my life.
Little did I know then that it would lead to something far greater than I could have imagined.
Next: Episode 2
“The Reality of a 50-Something’s Pain Management”
—The start of days without running. And then, small changes began to creep in.