Growth

I like to run, just get out and run, Forrest Gump kind of like to run. I cannot go as far as Mr Gump, I have a wife, job and bills to come back to. These things demand my attention in one way or another after about an hour of running. Oh, and the next day's aches and creaks. I don't worry too much about those while I am in Gump-mode, but, I should. They always hit me hard the next day. Focus!

Why is it that when one (what if it is just me?) Why is it that when I do something I 'enjoy' there seems to be an innate (and somewhat society expectation driven) desire to excel? Expound: I like to run, when I am in my best running place, I run like Vincent in the movie Gattaca, without saving anything for the trip home. There is no concern for time, distance, pace and the like. It is me, music and the pavement. My ragged breathing factors in there, alongside my screaming muscles and the stitch in my side that accompanies at times. I can stay in this place for a couple of weeks if I am lucky. When I leave, I do not know I am leaving until long gone.

"Are you running these days?"
"Yes, I am! I ran 5 miles yesterday."
"Really, what was your time?"
"Don't know, I do not keep track."
"You should, so that you know if you are getting better or not."
"Maybe I will."

So I start watching time and distance.I start doing repeats and drills and before long it is a chore. It is a thing I have to do because I promised someone I would run a race with them and get an award like I did last year. (So you know I wasn't great last year, there were three people in my division and I got silver. Here are the times; 1st - 15:51, 2nd - 23:30, 3rd - 35:02. Is that an award for running well or just an award for running? Strictly speaking I do deserve every bit of the silver plated plastic. You run once, get an award for showing up and then you need one for every run, it's bad, it's not just me).

My point; I like to run, I hate training, yet if I run the way I like, I do not do well at races because I am unable to push myself harder to go further, faster.

"Then just run like you like and don't race," you say.
I concur, why is this easier said than done? It feels wonderful to prepare for something and see it through, however grueling. It feels good to have your name in the paper a day after you bring your someone special a cheap trophy along with your runner's funk and gag-inducing T-shirt. It feels great!

I should go and ride my bicycle instead.

Friends

I have not made many friends in my three decades of living, let me more accurately say I have not kept many friends. Here is why...

As a child, I found that people stayed close to you for how useful you were to them. My neighbours only liked me when I had new toys. They would bully me out of my possessions thereafter, their gain. I would cry home and be told to be more careful with my stuff. Kids in boarding school stuck close usually for help with homework, before the boarding school period I had friends who like me were targeted for being related to teachers, the oft seen conglomeration of the weak and oppressed! In college similar interests brought people together. I was glad that my tennis pals where pals even away from the court. This was novel to me. Sadly by college I did not have any contact with the kids I grew up with, kids I went to grade school with. Now in adult life, I find that most people already have their connections, new ones are difficult to forge. (Oh, and all my college friends are dead, to me that is). You meet people all over, but, very few are friends thereafter. At least not for those of us that prefer to be socially minuscule.

I have found peace, somewhat cynically, in the fact that people, acquaintances, friends even are seasonal. They come and go. The 'real' people in one's life will tend to stay. For those at this transient age though, we or our friends will move to other spatial locations near or far. It is at this point that I get tired and flustered - when people leave they keep in touch for some time, but, this too shall pass. They make new connections where they are, so we (the past) are less and less needed until we die a natural death. Now I must for some reason go and make new connections too? I must replace these that have left? I must go out to meet new people and hopefully mesh with one or some of the many I 'try out'? And what happens when they, or I move away? How many times do I need to repeat this? See how I get tired?

Here is how a conversation went on the subject; "Exhausting is really accurate, when you think of all the time and energy (especially for loners like us, it takes more motivation than for sociable people) invested in getting to know people. In the back of our minds, we know the majority of these people won't mean anything to us once we're removed from their presence. So why do we bother? Not to sound lazy. Do we keep up the pursuit of meeting new people in the hopes that we shall find our next true friend? Or do we continue this because it's what society expects from us...? When I move away, how many of these buds will call me to say hey, when most of what they do now is call to say, "What time?" I guess we use people for what they're good for in the time they're in our lives. We all do it..."

I wish I had a friend who knew me in diapers, or in first grade. Someone who knows all my history because they were there. I envy that were I see it, a rare thing indeed. Not all friendships are forever. Very few are actually. I try to keep all the friends I make. I do not take social interaction lightly, it is a bit of an ordeal for me. I would rather avoid the whole thing, but, alas! Try as I might to refuse, I am a pack animal. Deviant. Yes, but, pack all the same. I will not cling to people anymore, the more I cling, the more it hurts when that bond is corroded by time and distance. The few life friends I have, I hope to keep. When I die I hope some old guy will be there to tell what an idiot I was in college, and then I got my first job and became a snob and how I met my wife and she changed my life and blah blah. It may be just one guy, I hope for two or three such tales.

We need each other, I will acknowledge it, I will not strive to live by it, I will not put much effort into it.

Fun

A friend of mine advised me to let go (of some troubling issues) and have fun. I chuckled to myself because I do not think I am capable of having fun.

In my mind, having fun involves one stripping off caution, hair-ties, self consciousness and at times decorum to fully enjoy an event, be it music, a downhill bike ride, a drive, conversation, movie, you name it. Fun involves stepping away from things I cannot leave for more than half a moment. Nothing I know is fun within half a moment! By the time it starts I am back in a "No Fun Allowed" state my little hourglass is up and I am busy processing. So despite doing things I love, I can not taste them enough to go "WOOHOO!" with any gusto. I am young and sadly do not recall a carefree day in my life. In every instance I am relaying my surroundings to my mind, making sure I am looking as well as possible, getting the most (information) out of the occasion, saying the sharpest, wittiest thing and thinking of the next, adjusting my hair without being vain, sounding intelligent without being snobbish, paying attention to everyone equally, defusing any potentially injurious statements and more - so many background processes are running I am incapable of savouring this moment I am working so hard to perfect.

When was the last time you went, "Woohoo!"?

Potential

In my friend's office was a plaque that read, "There is no greater burden than a great potential." I hate that saying, because it is so true! A rant from long ago went something like this, "We are told as children (I was) to dream big, aim high and the like. By so doing we set ourselves up for displeasure because however low we aim, most of us will not hit the mark we set. Our whole life thenceforth is spent in some level of remorse. For some, years are spent wondering what they could have done better, harder, longer to be 'in a better place right now.' Others will not dream or aim at all. In a way they are better of, whatever they hit is beyond expectation, so it is an achievement. Who is the happier putter, the one who is going for a hole in one and gets it in two, or the one who just hits the ball and makes his putt in two?" Is the glass half full or half empty?

I am often informed of my great potential, many gifts and the like. It is all well and good, but, now that all these things have been noted, I am expected to live up to them. Oh the mental-teeth-gnashing! What no one sees is the rift between where my 'great potential' places me and where I actually stand.

So maybe life is getting to that high chair. What say you? "Oh blast," I say, "It will be a long, tough hike!"

Death

Yes, a morbid place to start. I think about death a lot, I look forward to the rest.

I am currently reading a book by Mary Roach entitled "Stiff." It delves into the lives of human bodies after death. There is a whole new world of possibility that opens up after one is deceased. It is unfortunate we are ignorant of the good we can do with our "tents of flesh" once we are done with them.

I was watching a TV show with my wife and we brought us the issue of dating after one of us dies (tsk tsk, the things involved in today's newlyweds' quality time leave much to be desired huh?). A co-worker took it further and we discussed body-donation, do-not-rescucitate orders and the like. How badly hurt do I want to be before I can give a DNR order? If I do not do it beforehand, it will be too late, hence defeating my whole purpose of doing so (I would like to save my wife the pain of watching or waiting for me to die and the emotional 'he's better-he's worse' yo-yo.) What should be done with my body after I die? It is never too early or late to have this hashed out. Working in medicine, I know how fragile life is.

Bad start to a blog probably, we will see how it goes.