How I became a writer Part XVI

Title: How I became a writer

Part XVI

Running.  It means so many things to so many people.  According to some adults running can be a form of torture!  They will joke with me, “The only time I run is if a bear is chasing me!” or “I only run to the fridge between commercials!”  Some of these people are athletic and will run if they are playing a game of pickup basketball but what they mean is they don’t want to run mileage daily.  Others think running is bad for you!  They will tell me, “I want my knees when I am older, so I don’t run.  I walk.”  Recreational runners (aka jogger) want to clear their head, get some fresh air, and sometimes listen to music.  They don’t hurt themselves but they faithfully will put a certain distance of running into their day.  Then you have human beings that hurt themselves a lot and seem to like it!  Whether they belong to a high school track team, a local running club, or are a lone wolf, these people run to gain something.

“What?” you might ask.  “I have friends that regularly run 5Ks and they rarely win anything!” or “My nephew runs track but he doesn’t win anything.  He just does it to get a better time!”  That is my point exactly.  You don’t train for a race if you want nothing out of it!  Even when I am coaching and running speed work with the kids, even though I’m not competing, I still have a goal.  I want them to be successful so I am encouraging them with my example.  I am experiencing the pain with them, so that I can help them reach their goals.  Getting a PR (personal record) or winning a sixth place ribbon is just as important to one athlete as a states run might be to a different athlete.  A wise team rejoices in even their weakest runners accomplishments, as long as they are working hard. 

The funny thing about running is that once you set your goal to win, you have more then yourself to contend with.  You have other runners to battle as well.  I think this is why Paul writes, “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.”  He’s using running to talk about our spiritual life and is pointing out that there is a huge difference between a jogger, an athlete, and someone training to be number one.  To get into a race is easy but to win a race...that is extremely difficult!  This battle to win creates epic moments in athletics that I have had the privilege of witnessing for years in high school athletics!

I have many “hero” stories from track and cross country but today please let me tell you one story about a boy named “Brandon Marlatt.”  Brandon won his first race (of his ninth grade year) against a very varsity good team and an athlete who a powerhouses in the league.  The meet had other schools competing too and their coaches congratulated him as well as parents from our team but he noticed I was very quiet and it bothered him.  We got back on the bus and Brandon confronted me on it.  I said, “I’m glad you won but I wouldn’t get too excited yet,” or something to that effect.  I knew the good team team doesn't always go as hard as it can in the first race.  That weekend we faced that same team again at a large invitational and Brandon got beat their powerhouse this time.  When he came in I said, “Do you see why I wasn’t so excited?  We have a lot of work to do.” 

Marlatt is a hero and a team Captain in every sense of the word... he understood hard work.  In early October we faced that good team and their powerhouse again.  I was excited and nervous to see how he would stack up but that day was a nightmare!  Brandon got beat by the other champion by a minute at least!  Yipe!  He had worked so hard, done everything I had asked, so really the failure was mine as a coach.  I dreaded what he might say to me, but  all he said was, “We need to work harder!”  I nodded fiercely and said, “Absolutely!”  Instead of giving up or trashing me and the team, Brandon chose to continue to strive to win!  At the last invitational of the year he said to me, “Coach, we’ve been trying the slow to fast strategy but it doesn’t work for me.  I’d like to go out hard.”  “Alright,” I replied, nervously:)  He did do better that race but still lost to some boys that would be facing him in his bid to go to states.  You see, out of over a 150 boys, he had to be in the top five (minus a player from a winning team).  That is hard enough but that year the people in that top five were insanely fast!  How fast?  At the state meet that year Section V (that’s my section:) had four of our individual runners in the TOP ELVEN out of over a 120 runners!!!  On top of that the race was won by a Section V kid!!!    Yeah, getting to states was rough that year!  The superintendent of our school, Mr. Groff, took me aside and asked me what his chances of making it to states was.  I said carefully, “I’d like to think he has a chance!”  But he was a dark horse, who had lost many times that season to guys the five guys he needed to beat to win.  Could he do it?

I’ll never forget the county meet that year.  There were two other league powerhouses gunning for the state meet and they all clashed on that difficult county course.  When the boys race started those three were off like a shot as if they were running the 400 in track!  At least that is what it looked like, I have no idea of their actual speed, all I know is everyone else fell far behind!  Those three were in a line and like an Indian run they kept switching positions for first place!  It was an epic battle and when the dust cleared Brandon came in second.  It was a great race but once again he had come up short.  This did not seem to discourage Brandon... if anything it seemed to drive him more.  I had to sit on him not to train hard those last two weeks because he was so driven.  “You’re not going to gain any more fitness at this point,” I told him.  A weight lifting parent, Mike Cornell, who was observing practice that day, backed me up.  Brandon listened to us and did not go all out that week until the sectional race.

The race began with at least eight amazing athletes competing for FIVE spots!  When the runners came around after the first third of the course my heart sank!  Brandon was buried between fifteen to twentieth place!  It was OVER.  I was devastated.  I felt like a failure as a coach.  He had done everything I asked and now he was going to lose badly.  I felt like leaving the race, walking inside the building a half mile away, and eating a hot dog while staring at the wall.  I almost couldn’t bear to watch the end of this race.  Yet I knew I had to and woodenly walked to the a spot 400 meters (a quarter of a mile) from the finish line.  I stood there in a daze, detached, and now a spectator and not a coach.  I dress up for meets and must have seemed important, so a reporter asked me who I thought would be the front runners.  “The kid from ER will be first,” I said, dispassionately.  “After him will be,” and I named three other kids...none of them named Brandon Marlatt.  Over the hill the ER kid came just as I predicted.  He flew by us into the forest and toward the finish line beyond it.  (He is the one who won states that year:)  Then three kids came over the horizon, again just as I predicted... or... wait.  The two I expected were there but one uniform was off.  Instead of the red uniform of the powerhouse, the uniform was... black???  My heart stopped.  Brandon Marlatt was running neck and neck with boys that had beat him in every race the ENTIRE season!!!  How was this possible???  He had been losing so badly earlier! 

Instantly I snapped out of spectator mode, for I knew something about Brandon.  Brandon had the ability to miraculously “recover” deep in repeats or a race... whether this was shear will power or his ability to process lactic acid, I don’t know.  I just knew he could do it!  He had a chance to beat these two but would he hear me?  You see, when a runner is experiencing a lot of pain, they tend to have tunnel vision, and not hear as well.  I’ve had runners who have totally missed what I am saying to them, not because they are blowing me off, but they are in a fog of pain and determination.  The good news was this point in the course would bring Brandon within two feet of me and there were very few spectators with me.  Most of them were all on the other side of the sliver of woods watching the finish line.  When he got close to me I started screaming two words over and over, “Kick now!  Kick now!”  I’m sure he didn’t want to but he hit the afterburners and left two titans of the league behind... temporarily.  Kicking a quarter of a mile out from the finish line is a very risky move!  I waited there for all the other JT runners to come through and then I ran through the woods myself to hear how things turned out.  Brandon had taken second over all and won class D!!  He was going to STATES!!!!!  Later he told me he had wanted to quit during that race and thought he was going to lose for sure.  That is the very definition of a hero... a person who is on the edge of losing and stays in the fight, not sure of the outcome.  It was a massive test of character and Brandon had passed it with flying colors.  He was the perfect story hero.

In my writing journey the next book God led me to was written by a hard bitten agent, who had been around the block many times.  I am fairly certain the library discarded this book too BUT I can’t be sure because I don’t remember the author’s name.  The title was something like, “How to Write a Bestseller!”  Its cover was as generic as its title.  What the author stressed though was that character is what made a hero a good read.  Today’s TV and movie writers seem to disagree with that because they seem to think that characters that have strong moral character are boring.  Their characters constantly take the low road in a myriad of areas, constantly disappointing their fictional friends and family and their audience.  I agree with the retired agent.  High moral character does make for an interesting character.  He wasn’t saying your character should be perfect or shouldn’t struggle but he stressed the value of a high caliber hero.  What makes Frodo so heroic?  Oh, he struggles and even fails a few times but overall, he makes many tough decisions for the good of others.  It is Frodo’s strength of character that saves Middle Earth, not his fighting ability or cunning.  The same thing is true of Meg in “A Wrinkle in Time.”  Meg is not that popular in school and certainly not a warrior but she has very strong character.  Yes, she has advantages given to her by the three older women but it is her strength of internal character that defeats “IT”.  What is the big moment in “The Wind and the Willows?”  Why it is Toad growing from a vain and shallow character into a hero!  The climax of this isn’t the final battle for his home but in his speech at the end of the book, where he learns the value of others.  In “Enders Game,” what makes you like Ender?  Is that he is a savage, violent brute that destroys his opponents?  No.  It is his difficult journey of being a person with high character, forced into war, and trying to survive it with his soul intact. 

In Christian Fiction many authors deploy the “weak” moral character.  The hero often will agonize over even small decisions and he or she will struggle to be heroic, almost to a frustrating level.  It is like they are trying to write “Crime and Punishment.”  Oh, how I hated that book!  Did I read it for school?  No, it was a Christmas present.  I wanted to be more cultured so I read it.  I grew to despise the main character...hate him.  I was rooting against him.  Finally sixty percent of the way through the book, I closed the book in frustration.  “If I wanted to be depressed I would have just mediated on my own problems!” I thought darkly.  Popular fiction is escapist literature.  The heroes are not perfect but they are who we would like to be!  Who we aspire to be!  There problems are much more exciting than ours (I’ve never been called on to save the Galaxy, except in video games!) and their strength of character is what we rejoice in.  Meg struggled against an entity that has enslaved a whole PLANET!!  Frodo against an evil power that is far beyond the heroes of the age he lives in.  Toad is in a battle with himself, which sometimes is the hardest battle of them all.  I like to write about heroes that either grow to be highly principles or that begin that way.  I am proud to be an “escapist” Christian writer:)  My characters still need the Lord, despite how strong they are:)