Running Commentary: 5

Running Commentary: 5

June 26, 2012, Tuesday

Hottest day, ever, for the month of June: 109

     Laura got the job! Starting this fall, she will teach social studies and math.

     We did a Watusi dance right in the street...plus, the jumping up and down was a great pre-run, cardio workout!

     Seems like, 'It just doesn't matter,' is not used only for 2012 hill running inspiration. I told Laura that Al emailed last night. A Vietnam War memory returned to him after reading Running Commentary: 4. Murray's chant took him back for a revisit to Southeast Asia: Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand. "We would say ["It just doesn't matter"] from time to time...mutter it to ourselves and close buds."

     Al went on to explain that Murray's summer camp yell, to the soldiers, meant that whatever the military asked them to do, in the grand scheme of things, did not contribute to anything of real importance. Sort of like the government. No matter who is at the helm, the career bureaucrats are destined to screw it up. Then again maybe, Al's email mused, it does matter in our own private worlds--our psyches.

     Laura and I were quiet while running the next block, thinking about the information shared and the shaded meanings of Al's words. Laura broke the silence.

     Passing a just-cut lawn, Laura told me her grandfather was a barber. Actually, her father, grandfather, great-grandfather, were all barbers. Polish barbers. My mother was Polish, and my sister and I were the first to marry outsiders, she added.

     Laura continued with her story; one time, I took a pair of my grandfather's hair cutting scissors and practiced cutting grass. Then came a non sequitur: my father was mean. It wasn't that he drank; he was just physically abusive. Laura told me she left home as a young teenager to get away from him. But then, he finally left home to get away from us. We didn't even know when he died. Someone read it in a paper and called us.

     After a couple of double takes, to blance the running talk, I said, "See, we have something in common. My grandfather was a barber, too...my little White mother's father. He was a big bear of a man, with hands to match. I watched those hands like a hawk, though, because the first thing I'd do when visiting my grandparents is fling open the screen door and run into the house. My grandfather would be sitting in his rocking chair, and I'd jump into his lap for a hug. I learned that his definition of a hug and mine were not the same. He would always take my hands into his large ones, squeeze them into tight fists, look at me, and smile--squeeze hard. It hurt.

     When I was ten years old and walked down the long center aisle of the church, I stopped, stood on tiptoes and looked into the casket, eyes going stright to my grandfather's huge hands. They were still, and I thought, 'good.' I remember running back to my seat.

     First water break; sucking ice cubes; cold water poured on necks. Laura mentioned her right foot wasn't working right; her hip kind of hurt; "Look! I'm limping."

     "Come on," I said. "Time's up. Let's hit it."

     Solo time the next morning. On our break days from running, Laura goes and does what Laura does. I walk and listen to a train load of thoughts passing by. They keep me company along with the sounds of Pink, Lady GaGa, Exile, Katy Perry, the Steve Miller Band, or whatever 'keep-it-moving' sounds Joel downloaded for me.

     A few thoughts hop off and stay; most fade away to the land of the lost.

     I didn't tell Laura my grandfather story to be a 'show me yours and I'll show you mine'-- completing a tidy pattern to make a cutsie story. Rather, it was shared to underline an old lesson. Stored secrets aren't too special when they are given a bit of light. They are always familiar to someone. Messy, maybe--but, familiar.

     The grandfather-to-father story reminds me of what Harry Truman once said: "The only thing new in this world is the history you don't know." I think Harry was a smart guy, even though he got to be an American President.