Cross Country

Yesterday, I was covering the Manatee County (Florida) Cross Country Championships for a small, local newspaper (The North River News) and it brought back some really vivid memories. In fact, this nostalgia started early in the day when I was riding to work. It was in the low 40s and since I wasn’t in a car, I had quite a breeze on me. Cross Country was on my mind and I remembered the many, many mornings I had to get up at the crack of dawn and run – in a t-shirt and shorts – in the cold and, often, the rain. I ran as fast as I could just so I could cross the finish line and get back in the van.

I was there in time to catch the varsity girls’ and varsity boys’ teams. Watching the runners, I actually felt the excitement … so many runners and so many opportunities to pass just one more person. I wasn’t very fast so being 14th instead of 15th, for example, was a big deal to me. I was only Most Valuable and Captain because I was the only senior, I think. Actually, being a senior got me Captain but I may just have gotten Most Valuable because everyone else was even slower than me. Howe wasn’t exactly an athletic powerhouse. In fact, from what I hear, it isn’t now either.

That feeling of passing people, improving my time even a little bit and sprinting toward the finish … it got me as excited to start running again as putting together that 2008 Presidential Election Voter Guide got me excited about writing again (hence writing my first article for this local paper).

The Chapel That Doesn’t Count

I hate putting this under the “Faith” category. This is the Chapel That Doesn’t Count. It’s ugly. It’s totally devoid of any feeling of hallowed or sacred ground. I heard one teacher describe it as an airplane hangar.

It’s where they hold graduation and services when there are parents on campus because it’s so big. The only memories about it that make me smile are when Father Ghallager replaced all the regular services with the - and I kid you not – Close Encounters of a Eucharistic Kind program. I liked those only because the music was awesome. He’d put a tape recorder up to the microphone in the pulpit and we’d listen to this folky worship music that really reminds me of the Vineyard music I’d discover almost a decade later.

Most cadets liked him, I think, but the administration – then and to this day – really didn’t think much of him. His biggest contribution: bringing back the civilian clothes General Scott had banned at some point in the two years I was gone. He also allowed a lot of kids back in that Scott had kicked out for various reasons. Neither cadet corps nor administration were happy with that one.

Worst memory in this chapel: Father Morgan telling me – though quite sensitively and carefully – that, basically, my poetry sucked. I saw Father Morgan on one of my visits back a few years ago. I didn’t recognize him at all. He used to have this bushy beard and (relatively) long hair. Now he looks like a graying elder statesman. Actually, he looks exactly like Terence Stamp circa Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. He recognized me, however, and called me by name. I had to ask him who he was and was floored when he told me.

Above: Terence Stamp as Chancellor Valorum in The Phantom Menace and as General Zod in Superman II.

One more good memory: Father Morgan bringing me the cassettes he’d made me. He recorded the entire 5-record set of Bruce Springsteen’s 75-85 Live set which I then listened to constantly while running during Cross Country and Track practice.

Daily Alone Time

It was required that you be on a sports team – or participate in intramural (IM) sports. I agonized over this. I am not a team player. Wasn’t then and I’m still not. In the Fall of my junior year I chose Cross Country. The first coach we had actually made us do sprints and other crap. Together. But then … with Track in the Spring and the following year the new C.C. coach … all I had to do was run. Cross Country is a … I think 3.2 mile race and for track I ran the 2-mile.

So every day after classes, I’d change into my sneaks, shorts and t-shirt and grab my walk-man. I’d throw in a 90 minute tape. An album on each side. I’d run out into the country for 45 minutes, flip the cassette over, turn around and come back. Ten miles a day five days a week.

I couldn’t run fast, but I did win a few ribbons for something to do with athletics. I even won Most Improved my junior year and somehow Most Valuable my senior year. Pretty good for someone whose only experience with athletics in public school was getting beaten up by the jocks.

Those afternoons running through the corn fields are some great memories. Even the trips to CC and track meets had their good points. To this day, I love that “farm” or “country” smell. Running, running, running past farm after farm, running by John Pagin’s house, racing the Amish buggies, miles and miles of corn. Howe, Indiana was a mystical place suspended in its own time.

The best was getting back from my solitary “practice” and taking a shower before everyone else got back from their practice or IM with the rest of the dorm empty. I can’t tell you how much I have always hated showering with other people.