What are You?

Today was a day of rest.  We are enjoying having our friends' 5 year old daughter, Jessica, stay with us while our friends are off to Ethiopia.  They arrived safe and sound and are now catching some well earned sleep.  As for me, my attention wandered back to a somewhat odd conversation from a few days ago.

We were driving home from Thanksgiving dinner and my mind was wandering.  I overheard my 10 year old daughter Sarah ask my wife, "what was Grampa?"  I had missed the context, but with a clarifying question, we determined she was asking "what sports did Grampa compete in".  Then after identifying which Grampa, the answer was basketball (to which she chuckled, as Grampa is only 5' 6" these days) and football.  At this point my attention drifted back to driving, or the football games, or the fact that I was still overstuffed from Thanksgiving dinner.

A few minutes later Sarah commented, "... I'm not a runner."

To which Diane, my wife, responded, "you don't know if you are a runner, yet.  You might be."

Then I added, "I didn't know I was runner until high school"

After a moments thought Diane said, "I ran in high school, but I probably didn't know I was a runner until college."

Diane ran cross country in both high school and college.  She did not have an effective coach in high school and would have given it up if not for the influence of Coach Ben Parks.  But she stayed with it and went on to run in the state championships in college.  It was during that time in college that she developed her attachment to running and then to know that she was a runner.

Reflecting on her story got me thinking.  Then I responded, "I guess I didn't really know I was runner until after high school."

I ran cross country for just 2 years in high school.  I went to a good sized school (about 600 students in each grade), and we had 14 boys on the cross country team.  I'm not even sure why I signed up to run cross country.  I wasn't particularly good at it, and just to be clear, there is no false modesty here.  My running never counted toward the team's score.  In a race, each school's team consisted of 7 students whose place could contribute to the team's score.  The top 5 finishers were the ones that actually determined the score.

As I mentioned, our team had 14 runners.  I was in the 8th position.  Leader of the "second seven".  But never in the top seven.  So my race results never made a difference one way or the other.  In fact, you could determine where I finished in a race by taking the total number of runners and dividing by 2.  That would be my place.  The quintessential mid-pack runner.  Always finishing dead middle.  And when I dropped out after 2 years, none of the coaches asked why, or tried to convince me to stick with it.  My leaving was as non-descript as my running.

After graduating from high school, I didn't run much over the next eight years.  I did run occasionally and even took up a vegetarian diet after reading about the benefits of it in Runner's World.  But I didn't really have any goals, or training plans, I just would periodically lace up my shoes and head out the door.  I think mostly in response to stress or a need for some time to myself.  Or maybe because a thunderstorm was rolling through.  I loved to run in a warm rain.

After graduating college, settling in to a job, working too many hours and eating too many donuts, I started to run with a purpose.  I was beginning to feel out of shape and sluggish.  There was no question in my mind what I wanted to do - I wanted to run.  I so I started training.  Had my first injuries.  Ran my first road races.  It was during this time, somewhere in my mid-twenties when running firmly took root in my life.  No longer an after thought, but something I looked forward to.  I guess you could say that was when I knew I was a runner.

Whether intended or not, Sarah's question, "what was Grampa" got me thinking.  In her mind there is a connection between what you do and who you are.  But not just anything you do.  There is something special about the sports we choose to engage in.  And in some way they do have a role in defining who we are.

 I am a runner.  Diane is a runner.  What are you?