RUNNING TO EPICURUS

I only recall one comment that my teacher, Mrs. Skipper, included on my kindergarten “report card.”  She said that I was a good runner and won most of the foot races.  This was not a great accomplishment.  After all, my competition were kindergarteners.  But I did have a natural running gait and remember thinking of myself as fast.  A year later, in the first grade, I confided to my parents that what I wanted above everything else was a baseball cap that was equipped with goggles that I could flip down to keep the wind out of my eyes when I ran.  I’m guessing my parents had a good laugh over that one.  Needless to say, I did not get the hat and goggles.

Whatever running skills that I had apparently were limited to sprints in childhood games like tag, pom pom pollaway, and dare base.  I didn’t seem to have the stamina needed for long distance running.  I think the fact was that I didn’t have the patience to build up my cardio conditioning.  That came much later, when I was in my early 30s and, at the encouragement of an acquaintance, I bought a legitimate pair of running shoes along with a book that outlined a system for building up long distance conditioning.  For the next 30 years I maintained a running regimen that saw me rising as early as 4:00 a.m. 3 to 5 days a week to run 20 to 25 miles a week, sometimes more.

In my mid-60s, back problems spelled an end to my running days.  But from time to time I still have dreams about running.  In those dreams my running is effortless.  I could run forever.  That was never true, of course, but there were times during most of my runs when I was in a zone, so to speak, where I felt as if I were coasting downhill.  And then there was the relaxed high that I often experienced following my longer runs.  

The fact that I was a committed runner was part of who I was, something about myself that I felt good about.  But it was also running that led me to my first glimpse of mortality.  From a rational point of view we all understand that we are mortal, that our life is going to end.  But there also comes a time when we recognize this fact emotionally as well as intellectually.  No, I didn’t have a heart attack.  Nothing like that, but it was a recognition, nevertheless, something that all of us of a certain age experience.

During my running years I found I could run in all sorts of weather except heavy snow.  Generally, even subzero temperatures didn’t stop me, as I found that running heated me up within the first few minutes.  However, there came a bitterly cold morning when I was perhaps 50 that I literally came face to face with my mortality following a long (10- to 12-mile) Saturday morning run.  Perhaps it was that my complexion was ruddy from the cold or that I had lost a few pounds over the course of the run or that there were icicles hanging off my mustache.  In any event, there it was, a heavily creased, aging face looking back at me in the mirror.  “My god,” I thought, “I’m getting old.  How the hell did that happen?” 

Old photographs can have the same effect.  How many times have we come across old photos of ourselves and thought, “Boy, do I look young in that picture.”  Here I’m not talking about pictures from our childhood, but those from when we thought of ourselves as fully adult.  And not just photos of ourselves.  Everyone else looked younger too—family, friends, public figures.  Having said that, it’s clearly the case that we do not all age physically at the same rate.  Moreover, some of us maintain our appearance through artificial means, such as cosmetic surgery.

But at the end of the day we all wind up in the same place.

So, now what?  For me, the answer may lie with Epicurus, the Greek philosopher who lived from 341 to 270 BCE.  Little remains of his personal writings, but what we do have are the writings of his followers, who promoted his system of philosophy.  See, e.g., Lucretius’s On the Nature of Things.  Epicurus did not believe in an afterlife.  There is no heaven to strive for or hell to avoid.  This is the one life that we have, so we need to decide how best to live it.  His solution was to seek a life that maximizes pleasure.  

This fundamental philosophy has gotten an unfair rap.  Epicureanism has sometimes been equated with a prodigal sensuality, a focus on physical pleasure—orgies, bacchanals, etc.  But that’s not the type of pleasure that Epicurus was talking about.  Rather, it is the simple, unadorned pleasure that comes from the love and companionship of family and friends.  It is the pleasure, the contentment, really, in knowing that we have done something to the best of our ability and hopefully that things are better as a result.

During my running “career” I participated in dozens of charity runs, where I paid an entry fee to get a commemorative tee shirt along with a number tag to pin on the shirt and where I then lined up with hundreds or even thousands of other participants to run anywhere from five kilometers to half a marathon.  Not once did I dream of winning, which would have been laughable, or even of finishing first in my age bracket.  My goal in every case was simply to do the best that I could, so that at the end of the run I could look back with a relaxed and satisfying fatigue, recognizing to myself what I accomplished and knowing that I had run the good race.  

There’s a lot to be said for that.


© 2018 John M. Phillips