[For this brief series, I’ve shared updates on a few topics from my hometown of Charlottesville about which I’ve blogged previously. Leading up to this special weekend tribute to an influential Cville figure I got to see again earlier this summer!]
On a childhood
influence who exemplifies the best of community.
Of the handful
of experiences that have been genuinely defining across the course of my 44
years, I think long-distance running is likely the one about which I’ve written
the least in this space. There’s a reason for that: the last consistent running
I did (outside of on treadmills at various gyms, anyway, which really is an
entirely different animal from running outside) was my senior year in high
school, more than 25 years ago (he typed with a gasp). But for the seven years
before that, starting in 6th grade when my Mom and I trained for our
first Charlottesville 10-Miler together
(a race we would run almost every year between that one and my senior year), and
including my three years on the CHS cross-country team (about which I did
write, in a very different context, in
this post on my experiences of hazing during my freshman year),
long-distance running was as consistent a part of my pre-teen and teenage life
as anything.
I will always
associate running first and foremost with a community of two: my Mom and I, out
there on early mornings, often with our dog Tiah. These days, I’m also coming
to associate it with a community of three, as my sons have become part of their
high school cross-country (my older son) and track (both of them) teams. But in
the broader community of Charlottesville runners, of which we became part
through those Ten Milers and many other road races over the years, there was
another figure who absolutely and beautifully came to symbolize running to me: Mark
Lorenzoni. Along with his wife
Cynthia, a seriously successful long-distance
runner in her own right, Mark started and operated Ragged
Mountain Running Shop, a store that became and remains a Charlottesville
institution (we just got my younger son some new running shoes there while we
were in town in June). But he also and especially became the most vocal and
dedicated supporter of all things running in Cville, and most especially of
young runners.
“The loneliness
of the long-distance runner” is a clichéd but in many ways accurate phrase, not
just because of the
short story and film
of that name, but because compared to many sports running is a profoundly
individual endeavor, one where the battle is most fully against the voices in
our own heads. Nothing and no one can entirely change that fundamental nature,
not a running partner, not a team of fellow high school runners, and not
cheering crowds as the Ten Miler (for example) always drew. But at the same
time, given how much of teenage life can already feel isolated and lonely, it’s
pretty important that we find ways to make sure young runners (and all runners,
but in some particular ways young runners especially) also feel solidarity and
support, the best kinds of community and comradery. Mark did that amazingly
well, not just through formal events but through his very presence and voice,
before races, after races, during races, and at so many other moments along the
way. I can only hope that my sons find similar influences in their burgeoning
running careers—and am determined to do whatever I can to carry Mark’s legacies
forward.
Next series
starts Monday,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Influences you’d pay tribute to?
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