Paul E. Richardson - Running Is Flying: Aphorisms, Meditations, and Thoughts on a Running Life

to mom and dad

It is 1977. We are in a dark, airless gymnasium, a creation of the previouscentury. Basketball practice is winding down and Coachspatience has run out.

Enough. Baseline!

He is a man of few words.

We hope for a bit of mercy. If he is in a good mood, Coach will onlymake us run quarters, where we dip and touch the lines marking eachquarter length of the court before sprinting back again. Problem is,for the past century, every indoor sport known to humankind hasbeen played in this gym, and there are about 300 horizontal linespainted across the dusty floor.

Coach is inscrutable. He takes a long time looking us up anddown, considering our effort. Finally, he raises the whistle to his lips.His voice is measured, deliberate, authoritative. He pauses betweeneach word, savoring his delivery: Every.... Single.... Line.

And then the whistle blows.

Many of us have been saddled with the notion that running is punishment,a tool for humiliation and control. Is it any wonder that toofew adults see running as something liberating and enjoyable? Orthat it takes so long to get there?

In fact, many who take up running as a form of long-term fitnesstreat it as a self-inflicted penanceguilt mounting for every missed day,for not hitting an overly ambitious pace, for not measuring up to a PR.

This is so very, very wrong.

Running is hard work, yes. But it can also be fun and exhilarating.At its best, it recaptures the joy we experienced before runningwas recast as punishment, when we would sprint out of theshadows into a darkened cul-de-sac to kick a can, chase someoneon the playground, or race our dog along the beach.

And while that joy can be easy to find (remember finishing yourfirst 5-K?), it can be monumentally difficult to sustain in the face ofhectic, complicated lives. Indeed, a runners joy can be easilysquelched when he realizes that finishing that first 5k is just thebeginning, that running (and fitness more generally) is an endlesspursuit, something you must continue to do for the... rest... of...your... life...

Running is not a crash diet or a quick fix. For those who take itseriously, it is a lifestyle. And for all its bone-strengthening, arteryclearing,fat-burning benefits, running is not only a difficult lifestylechoice, it is also a rather bizarre, eccentric one. We runners consider itnormal to get up before the crack of dawn and run back and forth through the streets of our towns while the rest of the world is perfectlycontent to sleep another hour. We train for months to run an obscenelylong distance in three or four hours, paying for the pleasure, and oftenwe are doing it just to qualify for a chance to do it again under stillmore difficult circumstances, at an even higher price.

Yet this eccentricity is what I love about running. That plus thefact that it lets me eat pretty much whatever I want.

I also like that, as a sport, running is so natural and so simple: Allwe need are shoes and a pair of shorts... and some wicking shirtsand hats, a GPS chronowatch, friction-reducing socks, an iPod, agood pair of sunglasses, a heart rate monitor, and maybe one or twoother things.

It is the simplicity of this sport that gets me out of bed on thoseearly mornings, but it is the strangeness that keeps me going on thelong runs week after week. For it is this strangeness that reminds meto never, ever take myself or my adopted lifestyle too seriously. Actually,if I did take myself seriously, I would have to give up running,because I will never be fast or sleek or strong. Back on that high schoolbasketball team, I was renowned for my complete lack of speed, so Iknow I will never win a race. But I can be persistent, and I can enjoywhat I am doing.

Humor helps.

For me it does, anyway. When I run, my mind tends to wander tostrange places. The aphorism, thoughts, and meditations in this bookare a product of these wanderings. And of my warped world view.

It may be too much to expect that Running is Flying will lighten yourstep, lengthen your long run, or inspire a PR. But I hope it will at leastprovide some encouragement, and help you take yourself and thisbizarre pursuit a bit less seriously. Actually, if you take nothing elseaway from this book, take this: Running should never be punishment.It should be enjoyable. It should make you feel like you are flying.

Because you are.

Every... Single... Mile.

Paul Richardson

Montpelier, Vermont

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2012 by Rodale Inc.
Illustrations Paul Cox

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A tip of the running shoe to Bob Barrett, fellow devotee of LSD (the pace, not the drug) and post-run coffee, for being a patient and constructive sounding board, editor, and cheerleader.

Eternal gratitude to my non-running wife, Stephaniewho does not complain (much) about washing sweat-soaked running gear, or about my recurring aches and pains; and to my children, Sarah and Christopher, who endure the embarrassment of their middle-aged father running around town in broad daylight.

Continued thanks to my mother, Helen, who tirelessly supported the many sports pursuits of three boys; to my father, Jim, who is still flying on the other side of 80would that we all should be so lucky; and to my brothers Jim and Mike, who seem to have gotten first pick of the sports talent genes, but who were kind enough to leave a few for me.

Finally, a special thank you to John Atwood and Shannon Welch at Rodale, who got this idea and helped carry it across the finish line; and to artist Paul Cox, for his funny, richly textured illustrations.

Paul Richardson is a writer, translator, editor and publisher. Born and raised in California, he attended college and graduate school in the Midwest (Central College and Indiana University, Bloomington). He was bitten by the Russian bug in Leningrad, in 1981, shortly after swapping his tattered down jacket for a black marketers fur hat. In 1989 and 1990, Richardson was deputy director of one of the first successful Soviet-Western joint ventures, a publishing company based in Moscow.