An inauspicious start

It all started in the field house of Wausau West High School, early spring 1982.

I was 16 years old, and set to run the quarter mile, my first race ever. It was an indoor meet, so instead of running one lap around the track, I think I had to make the circle four and half times.

With a paunch that I had carried since junior high school, I wasn't exactly the ideal specimen to compete for Colby High School. But deep down there was the hope that there was an undiscovered runner inside me with just the right mix of speed and endurance to make a star. Maybe when the gun went off, the inner animal would be unleashed and I would be transformed.

Despite these unspoken and almost unthought dreams, I was petrified. My heart was jumping like a hamster in my chest as we took our marks, and it seemed to scream when the gun went off. For what seemed like minutes, I stood there in my crouch, and my competitors took off like rabbits. By the time I did get moving, I lumbered along, with gasping lungs and scorching thighs. I held the eyes of my friends standing along the track, pleading wordlessly for help.

I was last that race. And every single race I ran for the rest of the season and the one after that. I moved up from the quarter to the mile and two mile, which did nothing but prolong the agony.

I'm 42 years old now, and I've toed hundreds of starting lines since that inauspicious start to my running career. I lost the excess weight, put it back on. Quit running and started again. Never been better than a middle of the packer, but there's always the hope that some day the real me, the one who blazes to the front of race and never relinquishes the lead, will emerge.

Of course, it takes work to become a great runner. Discipline. There needs to be speed work, long runs, plans and consistency. I have done none of this.

I've also tried to become a great bicyclist, cross-country skier, and for a few short weeks on a rink in White Bear Lake, Minn., a hockey player. None of it took.

My athletic career is a reflection of the rest of my life.

I've spent nearly 20 years trying to perfect my skills in a dying profession, newspaper journalism. I've had plenty of success, but I've also seen plenty of my coworkers move onward and upward, leaving me behind to choke on their dust. Most of the time they deserved it, a few times not.

Now I'm not complaining about any of this. I still have naive faith that we all get what we deserve in this life, one way or another. And I've spent way too much time on the couch to whine about the unfairness of it all.

But there have been times when I've gotten down on myself for my singular lack of ambition, talent and drive.

No more.

I've decided that it's time to relish the mediocrity.