Playing Fair and Being Kind

The first of August. Summer in Maine is gorgeous. The Castle is looking good. I will have this month and a little of September to enjoy it. Then I will leave for New Mexico to start a new project doing workshops using the Alternatives to Violence Project training methods. I look forward to that new adventure. Meanwhile I have been remembering pieces of history and also trying to get into more reading. I think I have a childhood trauma condition that prevents me from focusing which bugs me when I try to read. I’m working on it.

Here is something that came to me earlier today. Rabbit, rabbit reminded me of the name we give the pace setter in running events. The guys out front we call “the rabbits”. Convoluted thinking perhaps. Please have a lovely day and enjoy the  summer.

THE CURE IS WORSE THAN THE AILMENT

I remember hearing a tall tale about a man who suffered from migraines and spent a great deal of time visiting various healers with no luck. Finally the only solution seems to be castration. He is horrified at the diagnosis and searches further for an alternative but nothing works for him. He eventually accepts the facts and goes forward with the surgical procedure.

During his recovery he becomes hopelessly sad and lethargic and he seeks help with his depression. A therapist prescribes a life changing regimen including a whole new wardrobe. The man visits a haberdasher in his town to begin the new way of life. He is being fitted for clothing from the skin out. Complete new wardrobe. The haberdasher is a true professional and measures carefully and suggests various styles and trends for dressing nicely. Before he measures though he playfully guesses the size and he is always correct. When he asks the man what size jockey shorts he wears the man answers, “size 32”. “Size 32! Oh no. That can’t be. I’d guess at least a 36. If you tried to wear a size 32 your testacles would be compressed and you’d have migraines that would never go away!”

So, I have had a similar experience that you will have trouble believing. That is why I told the tale above; so you would be prepared.

I recall the seventies was when the running shoe fad really took hold. Prior to that runners wore sneakers or whatever sporting type shoes they could find. Generally, though, it was Keds that kept the crowd on the roads. Usually they were the hightops. We called them basketball shoes. We were rugged back then. Lace up a pair of canvass top basketball shoes and hit the road. No stretches, no water, nothing but the pavement. Clop, clop, clop, away we’d go. We’d run a couple of miles during lunch, telling jokes or talking business and then hit the showers. Then we discovered Nike! A good pair of running shoes, made for running, cost under thirty dollars. Keds cost about eight or nine.

Here I need to include a little back story. When I joined the Navy we got our uniforms sort of thrown at us during the first day. Regardless we were still measured carefully so we would look good. I remember my feet were measured at 10 ½ double D. That was in 1957. I wore the same size for many years after.

Back to running. There was a general hazard to long distance running in those days, and I suspect the malady persists to this day, of runners toe nails on the large toes turning black due to all the pounding from foot strikes. Distances beyond 5 miles would cause the large toe nails to take such a beating they would develop a blood blister causing the nail to die and eventually fall off after a few days. We called it “runner’s toe”. It was quite common and well known with us road dogs.

Well, I went to a sporting shoe store in Chula Vista around the time of the fad and emergence of slick new running shoes. Second Sole was one of a national chain of shoe stores that had quite a few brand names in stock. The store was new-age and very customer friendly. Sales people were plentiful and very well versed on proper fitting and styles for the individual runner. I was impressed with the sale person who helped me. He spoke a new language that was inspiring. We chatted for a while about the construction of the shoes and the fun of running and places we’d both gone running in the San Diego region. Finally we got down to the business of selecting a shoe for me. He looked down at my feet and asked, “What size shoe do you wear?”

“I promptly answered, “10 ½ double D”.

He cocked his head at me and said, “10 ½ double D? If you wear a 10 ½ double D your big toes are going to turn black and the nails will fall off. You look more like a 12.”

He had me sit and we measured my feet and sure enough I was a heavy 11 ½. I started from that point on wearing my new running shoes and rarely did my large toe nails suffer another injury. All those years my feet continued to grow I kept buying wider shoes instead of longer ones.

I joined the San Diego Track Club. They would meet at Mission Bay Park Sunday mornings and people would form groups and run various distances together. There were a lot of young beautiful men and women dressed in stylish running togs, beautiful shoes and great bodies all around. Those were heady days for sure. I was a Nike fan and I had several pair of running shorts that were scarlet and a few shirts from 5K’s and 10K’s I’d collected from around. I kept up style-wise and performance-wise as best as I could. We were all beautiful people you know. We’d stretch and steal glances at each other copying our SDTC leaders in form and effort. We were so beautiful you wouldn’t believe it.

Then we’d form up our groups and take off. I usually stayed with a group that ran the 8 or 10 miles course. Water was laid out for us along the route so we could stay hydrated. We’d stride along in groups of 5 or 6, feet and clothing whispering, swish, swish, swish. Breathing was easy, except for me. I was huffing and puffing because I’d just stopped smoking a few months before. I was gasping while the others were breezing along.

There was another guy who, like me, was a bit unorthodox. He was tall and lanky and ran kind of like he was falling over left and right with each step. His loose style worked for him though because he kept up and even stayed ahead of me often. What fascinated me was his shoes. He had a pair of wingtips with no laces. That’s right. Regular dress shoes without laces. Plus he wore no socks. He was barefoot inside the wingtips. He’d run clop, clop, clop. I never saw him complain and he ran just fine.

Today I’m glad I saw him and had this experience with him. My memory of him has helped me to loosen up my attitude and to break my military conditioning regarding uniform correctness. His unorthodox appearance didn’t affect his performance one bit. Oo-Rah! to him.

G. M. Goodwin 1 August 2017