The Woodberry Harrier 2015: Volume 4

Slow Times, Fast Times

Friday morning my colleague John Amos and I spent first period talking with a large group of seniors about boredom, and I had the subject in my head all day as we traveled to Alexandria and raced EHS. It’s not something I’d ever really thought about outside my exasperation with students for professing boredom with the likes of Shakespeare. I was surprised to learn that many great thinkers have pondered it, from Kierkegaard to Susan Sontag.

Bertrand Russell makes a wonderfully valuable distinction between “stultifying boredom” and the “fructifying” kind.  Boredom becomes deadly when we fill it with “drugs”---any mindless, numbing distraction or amusement.   But the same dull moment becomes fertile when we fill it with “vital activity”--such as focused thought, attentive presence, or quiet awareness.

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He argues that the good life comes in large measure from the right use of—the right relationship to--the most unexciting times, which then become the wellsprings of creativity, success, and growth, not to mention peace of mind and contentment.  (He says that the wrong attitude toward boredom “makes life hot and dusty and thirsty, like a pilgrimage in the desert.”)

I wonder if there is any endeavor which teaches this lesson more powerfully than running cross country. Friday we had one of those races you dream about when you think of the sport:  Racing under cool blue skies through the oranges and reds of fall foliage, we finally put together the race we’d been trying for all season.  Everyone on the team had a big PR, we finally worked together and kept our packs tight, and we finished strong. Confidence and good cheer were floating in the clear air as we stretched after the race.

But that afternoon was possible only because we’ve filled so many boring ones with “vital activity”:  grinding out lap after lap around the Barbee field trying to hit the same pace; pushing up Jones Mountain only to turn back down to do it again and then again and again; doing rep after tedious rep of heel raises and runners poses and balance-board squats; holding yoga poses until a limb feels numb; rolling, stretching, and soaking; listening to the same predictable advice over and over, day in and day out.

Of all the many profound lessons running teaches, developing this kind of productive patience may be the most valuable of all. I think part of Friday’s palpable joy came from the collective realization that all that boring work was actually something quite amazing in disguise.

Here are the results:

WFS vs. EHS
@ Episcopal
23 October, 20015
WFS 18, EHS 44
1-5 Split:  1:28
Runner	Place	Time
Singleton	1	16:30	a 21-sec. season PR, a 10-sec all-time PR
Carrington	2	16:57	a 14-sec. all-time PR
Rich	4	17:34	a 53-sec. season PR, a 13-sec all-time PR
Jacobs	5	17:43	a 27-sec. all-time PR
Tydings	6	17:58	a 55-sec. season PR; a 53-sec. all-time PR
Hernandez	8	18:23	a 42-sec. season PR
Gussler	9	18:23	a 1:27 season PR; a 44-sec. all-time PR
Kacur	12	18:54	a 45-sec 1st season PR
Duke	14	19:21	a 1:20 1st season PR
Wall	15	19:22	a 2:23 season PR; a 42-sec. all-time PR
Pittman	16	19:26	a 25-sec 1st season PR
Daphnis	19	20:00	a 1:25 1st season PR

We are off next weekend as we begin to sharpen for the Prep League Meet in Richmond on 6 November and the VISAA State Meet at Fork Union on the 13^th.  We have a lot of work still to do, but I know now that they will bend themselves to the tasks with renewed confidence.