A Walk in the Woods

So this is a “Sunday Story”, on a Tuesday. There’s no politics today – just a story about cross country running, and a walk in the woods.

Championship Season

It’s October, and for me, a month of officiating cross country meets.   It’s a great month to be out in the “world”.  The leaves are turning, the temperatures are moderating, and the kids and coaches and crowds are “amped”.  October is “championship season” in cross country, when all the work, all the miles, all the “blood, sweat and tears” of months and even years of preparation comes to an end.  

There is no “bye” to the championships in cross country running.  Either you make the place, as a team or individual, or you don’t.  The “subjective” no longer matters; work, talent, sportsmanship, leadership, how fast you ran last week:  those are all great attributes.  But cross country in October is a cold, hard, objective sport.  The top teams and individuals go onto the next meet; the rest don’t.  It’s not even about “time”, it’s all about place in the race.

Stomping Ground 

Cross country doesn’t usually require a whole lot of officials.  To do a track meet in the spring, it requires at least five officials, and often fourteen to cover all the events.  In cross, most meets have three or four.  There are clerks to check-in the runners, starters to fire the gun, and a referee to make final judgments.  Once the gun goes off, the athletes are virtually unsupervised for most races.  But come October there are “umpires” stationed throughout the course, usually every few hundred yards.  So while officiating jobs are hard to come by in September, come October there’s a lot more to do. 

So this was my fifth meet in October, and my third meet in a row. Saturday was the High School District meet, and Sunday the Middle School State Invitational. But yesterday I officiated a “junior varsity” meet at my old stomping grounds, Watkins Memorial High School.  

This is the last meet for these athletes. They didn’t make the top seven varsity positions on their teams. But,  it’s one more opportunity to run, to set a personal best, and to end their cross country season on a high note.   And it’s on the unique running course at Watkins.  Of the three mile race, two miles are run on woods trails.   It’s beautiful:  the leaves are turning, the course is dry and fast, and unlike most cross country courses today that run around athletic fields; competition is in the forest and the pine trees.  

The Course

I’ve spent forty-six years helping to prepare those trails for runners.  There’s lots of folks that can claim a “piece” of Watkins, including years of Watkins cross country teams; coaches and parents who have raked and hauled lumber and gravel and mulch.  For me, my role is now the “roots”, carefully painted white to contrast to the dirt floor.   Kids still occasionally trip on the them, but it’s not because the roots were hidden.  “Did you see the root you tripped on?  Why yes, it was painted white, but I tripped anyway,” is a conversation I have on the finish line.

So I arrived early at Watkins, to take a walk in the woods before the buses pull in and the “Last Chance, Fast Chance” meet begins.  

My Walk

When I was the Dean of Students, the “discipline guy” of the high school; there were times when my dual role as Dean and Cross Country Coach intertwined.  While the woods are great for running, and for studying flora and fauna, they are also an attraction for students to do less esoteric activities.  I found kids smoking cigarettes or marijuana. I broke up fights that were planned over lunch in the cafeteria. And I really got mad at the kids who decided that the Watkins trails were a great place to “four-wheel” and tear things up.  

Bob Seger wrote a song called “Night Moves”, about sex in high school.  One line is; “Out past the cornfields where the woods got heavy…”.   The Watkins woods are equidistant between the high school and middle school, that’s 2700 “hormonally challenged” kids.  It shouldn’t be a surprise that while they probably don’t know Bob Seger or his song, some choose to go “out past the school road where the woods got heavy,” to work on their “Night Moves”, or more literally, their “Afternoon delights”.   

I wasn’t sneaking around the woods yesterday, I was just taking a walk on the familiar path, letting the fall changes soak in.  With the new high school and new school road, the “back” of the course is a lot more accessible than it used to be.  I ran into a few of the Watkins runners, commuting from the high school to get ready for the race.  Then I made the turn on the back trail, and headed towards the “boards” that were built to get over the swampy area just before the mile-mark.

Official-Official

I saw a young man sitting on a log, smoking a cigarette.  He looked up, aghast that there was some adult approaching his space.  Then I saw a young lady sitting on the dirt at his feet.  At first I just thought they came to enjoy an elicit smoke, and said; “You’re not my problem, I don’t work here anymore”.  Then I realized, the young lady didn’t have pants on.

It’s still not my problem, not part of my “officiating contract”, but soon hundreds of kids will be running the course, first checking out the path, then competing in the races.   It’s not the “hidden haven” this young couple was looking for.  My suggestion: time for them to get dressed and move along.  They answered in unison, “Oh Sh*t”, and I agreed, “Oh Sh*t, it’s time for you to go!!”.  Their afternoon delight was over.

Then I got my officiating gear on, loaded up my starter’s pistol, and went to work.  There were 200 some athletes competing in the “Fast Chance” invitational, a girls race and a boys race.  A parent from one of the schools actually thanked me for officiating.  I appreciate that; officiating can have its difficulties and parents can be less than friendly.  But as usual at Watkins, the races went flawlessly.  There was nothing to complain about.  The kids focused on making their last race the best – and from their expressions at the finish line, many of them did.

It was a perfect October day for a run in the woods.  

The Sunday Story Series

2021

• Riding the Dog  – 1/24/21
• Hiking with Jack – 1/31/21
• A Track Story – 2/7/21
• Ritual – 2/14/21
• Voyageur – 2/19/21
• A Dog Story – 2/25/21
• A Watkins Legend – 3/7/21
• Ghosts at Gettysburg – 3/14/21
• Lessons from the State Meet – 3/28/21
• More Lessons from the State – 4/4/21
• Stories from the Road – 4/11/21
• A Bear Wants You – 5/1/21
• My Teachers – 5/9/21
• Old Friends  – 5/23/21
• The Gift – 6/6/21
• Echoes of Mom – 6/20/21
• Stories of the Fourth – 7/3/21
• Running Memories – 7/25/21
• Lost Dog of Eldora – 8/1/21
• Dogs and Medals – 8/8/21
• The New Guy – 9/5/21
• Stories of 9-11 – 9/12/21
• The Interview – 9/26/21
• Night Moves – 10/3/21
• Funeral for a Friend – 10/11/21
• National Security – 10/24/21
• Boots on the Trail – 10/31/21
• Taking Care of Mom and Dad – 11/14./21
• Dogs Found and Lost – 11/21/21
• Watching Brian 12/12/21
• Stories from Shiloh – 12/19/21
• Team Trips – 12/26/21

2022

• Uphill, Both Ways  – 1/9/22
• Old Trophies – 1/30/22
• The Last Time – 2/7/22
• Olympic Miracles – 2/13/22
• Mind Numbing – 2/20/22
• Track Weather – 4/3/22
• What’s Missing – 4/11/22
• A Scouting Story – 4/17/22
• Waterproof Paper – 5/8/22
• Origin Stories – 5/22/22
• Origin Stories – Part Two 5/29/22
• Back at State – 6/5/22
• Out in the Country – 6/19/22
• Pataskala Downs – 7/4/22
• Car Stories I – 7/24/22
• Car Stories II  – 7/31/22
• Old Man Experience – 8/7/22
• Cross Country Camp – 8/14/22
• New to the Pack – 8/21/22
• Car Stories III – The Bus – 8/28/22
• A Day in the Life – 9/4/22
• Stupid Human Tricks – 9/18/22

2023

• Fair or Foul – 2/26/23
• Immigrant Story – 3/12/23
• Busy Season – 5/15/23
• Of Jeeps and Bucks – 5/28/23
• A Pole Vault Story  -6/11/23
• End of an Era – 6/25/23
• Paybacks – 7/2/23
• Graying in Pataskala – 7/17/23
• Being a Goat – 7/23/23
• Toy Truck – 8/20/23
• Medical Terms – 8/27/23
• Missing Margaritaville – 9/3/23
• The McGowan – 9/10/23
• Who’s Watching – 10/22/23
• The Saturday Before – 10/29/23
• A Tale of Turkey, and Dogs – 11/26/23
• Bruno’s Story – 12/3/23
• Out in the Country – 12/10/23
• Christmas Eve – 12/24/23

2024

• Rube Goldberg – 1/12/24
• Our Pataskala Kroger’s – 2/5/24
• A Sad, Sad, Dog – 2/11/24
• Singing in the Tornado – 3/3/24
• Your Safe Spot – 3/17/24
• Easter Dawn – 3/31/24
• Swarms – 4/14/24
• Lowest Common Denominator – 4/28/24
• Seniors – 5/12/24
• Season’s Over – 6/22/24
• Camp Morning – 6/30/24
• Jeeping – 7/7/24
• How Mondo Won the Gold and Started a Dog Fight (almost) – 8/6/24
• Fifty Years of the McGowan – 9/8/24
• A Walk in the Woods – 10/22/24