I Sold Fruit

Twenty years ago, I had a great job.  I sold fruit overseas.  I would travel to places in South East Asia like Singapore or Thailand or a dozen other really cool places, visiting with customers, drinking too much expensive liquor, eating too much great food.  I spent quite a bit of time there and I thought I had some great stories to share, but when I told those stories to people I knew, it was like the cognitive switch in their brain just flipped off and they quickly changed the subject to something really interesting like how the girl at the haircut place spoke with improper diction or how parking the car was such a burden because they had to park so far from the front door to the grocery store. I was doing something wrong I guess because everybody did the same thing, they didn't want to hear about my travels, so I just stopped telling them. I didn't tell anybody those stories for a long time.  I just put that part of my life in a box. In the process, I forgot about those stories, and I lost a little bit of myself.

Last year, I ran in Ironman Couer d'Alene. For me, it was and still is a huge thing and I think I have a few good stories to tell, but when I tell people those stories, they get that all-too-familiar distant, bored look and change the subject. I didn't understand for a while why my Asia travel stories and my IM stories bore the hell out of people, but now I have a theory and it's this - people can't comprehend things that are beyond their own small view of the world; they can't fathom the idea that Ironman is a possibility for them; they can't believe in the idea of participation. That is what it comes down to, isn't it?   Belief?  If you believe, you are already there. Write that down.

Anyway, if it isn't possible that they could compete in Ironman, or they don't believe it is possible, then my story of Ironman must be a lie. I must be a liar right? If they can't do it, how could I?

So my word to you is this, if you tell someone about your Ironman adventure, and they get a glazed 'I would rather be anywhere but here' look in their eye, then you are dealing with a non-believer. They might muscle up and walk a mile a week, but that is it. I pity them.

I ran four miles today. I had a good run, except my knee felt like my 35 years ago imp-of-the-devil ex-girlfriend that ripped my teenage heart out of my chest was back, sticking red hot needles into my knee. She must have bought a real voodoo doll that you stick needles in. She was a freak of nature in that she was the first human born without a soul and my knee remembered her today. My lungs were good on my run, my knee needed an hour with a psychologist specializing in exorcism.  And ice and Ibuprofen.

I get asked all the time why I run Ironman, or I am asked why I train like I do to get ready for Ironman. Good questions both. I get up at o'dark thirty to swim, I run in fairly constant pain, I bike on roads that are ruled by hill-billies that throw beer bottles when they drive by in their rusted out chevy pickups. Sometimes it's hard to see the upside. I refuse to use the 'because it's there' thing because using a cliché is beneath me. Since I have no imagination, I cant think up my own answer. Its one thing to not have a ready answer for others, but I should at least know the answer for myself. I mean, why do anything if you don't know why? Until today, I felt the answer more than I understood the answer. I know, that sounds like something your nineteen year old philosophy student might have said, but its real. Until today, I didn't really know why. Today I read in a book by my favorite author, Nelson DeMille the following:

“A boat in the harbor is a safe boat, but that's not what boats are for.”

Just soak that in.

Is your boat safe in the harbor? Risking nothing, accomplishing little? Or do you risk some for great reward?

If you like the quote as much as I do, feel free to use it. Be nice and give Nelson the credit.