Ask Any Runner
We’re healthy: so we run. We’re the soccer players, the track geeks, the cross country gladiators. We’re the runners, or at least the runners traversing this community.
The hardest part of a race, is a little after halfway, and just before the finish. It’s right after the second lap of the mile, and just before the last one.
It’s after you’re halfway through, that the newness of the experience wears off, and you realize how tiring all this business really is. The focus shifts from some individual push for speed, to a frightening realization of the collective momentum of the entire group at full stride. There’s no way I can keep up this pace. I will surely fall behind.
It’s also just before it’s over, with the finish in sight. You’ve set a hard pace, which puts you in a good position. But it also means you’re completely spent. At your weakest moment, in total vulnerability, is when the pressure to perform is the greatest.
But a race is a race. To run, is to run. So, the hardest part of the race, is sometime after the holidays, and just around May.
After classes begin to pickup, and the novelty of your new subjects wear off, the sheer impact is immense. Just the ridiculous amount of material you need to get through, with so little time to do it. Inadequate and defeated: that’s what life makes of you. God help me, I’m totally swamped. Why, oh why, did I ever think it was a good idea to take so many classes?
And when you’re just barely afloat, and happy just to have made it thus far, someone throws in a cruel cumulative evaluation. Everything you’ve ever learned: return it in a week. Do it seven times, and do it without mistake!
There’s a fellow that I know, whom I admire very much. He goes for a run every day, and oftentimes more than one. He just barely finishes the first, collapsed a bit beyond the mark. Chest heaving, barely grasping enough to breathe. And not ten minutes later, he’s already well on his way, running the second.
Perhaps human beings aren’t quite so weak after all. Sometimes our bodies may tremble, and perhaps our resolve may be fickle. But, our determination does not waver. To run, and run, and run again. Day after day, year after year. Weekends are for work. Vacations are the same.
Keep at it! You will run your way through school, and run yourself to the next. You will go as far as you want, and everything you want is yours to take! Everyone knows it - you deserve it.
Off to the Beach!
Yes! Exciting! Vacation! And the beach! This will be so exciting and fun!
I look forward to studying in a tent.
Farewell, waking world of this domestic teenage tragedy. Until later!
We spend the first part of our lives learning to live with ourselves, and the rest of it learning how to share it with another.
Thank You!
I guess people always spend their time bitching, because it’s easier to criticize, than to compliment. Good things about other people…they always go by unnoticed. We are UNGRATEFUL BASTARDS.
I’ll take this opportunity to formally break the trend.
Thank you, Capital Center! I bitched about the tiny little school desks we had to sit in for the SATS. You, were far better. A giant table for two, with clocks all around the room. Thank you!
Thank you, Mexicans on Craigslist. Making me shit money through my nostrils.
Thank you, Costco. Did you know that a single serving of two slices of your pizza is 1400 calories? Well I knew that. But I don’t care: You are DELICIOUS.
Thank you, Tycho. Your music is beautiful. You must be an equally beautiful person on the inside.
