"Try Not to Suck"

 

Working my way through the 2010 Richmond Marathon crowd I laughed out loud when I saw a man holding a sign that said, “try not to suck.” But as I entered my starting corral, a runner next to me said, “Can you believe that guy’s sign? Just what I don’t need, a negative comment!” Negative??!!!!....

I am well acquainted with negative comments. In 1994 I was departing for Lackland AFB — Basic Military Training (BMT) aka “Boot Camp.” I was 35 years old, a Preschool Director, wife, and mother of two children. Whatever their reasons, people were incredibly negative and not shy about sharing their negativity: “You’ll never make it through boot camp.” —“What a waste of your education.”—“You must not love your family.”—“Can’t your husband do it?” etc... Fortunately, I did not accept their negativity.

At BMT I was the Physical Conditioning Monitor for our flight. Every morning I stood on the tarmac, flashlight in hand, arm raised (like the Statue of Liberty) as our flight came into formation. We ran in formation, I set the pace.

One woman, 18 years old, was recycled into our flight. She was acing all aspects of training except the run. She was 5 seconds too slow, 5 SECONDS!!! So she was “recycled” back 2 weeks in the training cycle for another chance to avoid being discharged. I was ordered to run with her every evening until she made the required time.

As we headed out for our first evening run, I asked her, “What do you have to say about those 5 seconds?”
“Well,” she replied, “My dad says I run like a girl.”
“Your dad is not here, he is not running. You are. What do YOU say?”
She paused, smiled, then said,” I guess I’ll try not to suck.”
It turned out simply trying not to suck was positive enough for her. She eventually ran 5 seconds faster and graduated with our flight.

... Years later, standing at the start of the marathon I remembered that young woman. So I replied to my fellow runner*, “I know someone who would think that comment was positive. Sometimes the word “try” is all you can muster and often that more than enough.”

*I didn’t see this runner for 26 miles until the last turn towards the downhill finish. As I made the turn there he was. He looked at me and said, “We’re not sucking!”
I had just enough breath to laugh.