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Relay

Relay

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I had an epiphany this morning.

I was running on the treadmill, listening to Louise Connell and Andrea Von Kampen on my Nano, mind wandering among memories of summer hikes in Baxter State Park and New Hampshire’s White Mountains and Acadia, when a sudden recollection of another run, another race, came into my head.

It was the spring of my sophomore year in high school. It was the season-ending Cape Ann league track meet hosted by my school, Hamilton-Wenham Regional High School. It was the meet’s final and deciding event, the mile relay. And it was the highlight of my brief career as track and field athlete.

In the mile relay, each of four teammates run a quarter-mile, once around the four hundred forty yard oval, passing a short metal baton from one runner to the next. I was selected by our coach to run the second leg.

The first leg was run by Neil Smith, another sophomore, a distance specialist, a miler. He ran a brave race, hanging tough with the sprinters. When he passed me the baton, our team was in third place, three or four yards out of second.

I turned and threw myself into a dead sprint. I shot past the runner in second place and fixed my eyes on the back of the runner in the lead. For fifty-three seconds, I saw nothing the back of his singlet, straining with everything I had to catch him. I closed the gap to three yards, but no closer, and as we came off the final turn and headed down the home stretch to where the next racers awaited us, I could push no harder and he began to increase the distance between us.

I do not remember the name of our third runner, but he blew away the rest of the field. When Dave Belton, our senior anchor, took the baton, he had a thirty yard lead and by the time he finished his lap, it was fifty. We won the race! We won the meet! It was an exhilarating, intoxicating, most proud moment.

And yet, over the years, the sweetness of my recollection of that race has been tempered by some doubt and regret. We won, but it was our third and fourth runners that brought us the victory. I failed to pass the lead runner. I closed the gap so quickly, but could not finish the job.

But I held my ground. That was my epiphany this morning. I held my ground. I held my ground and did my best. I did my job and put my team in a position to win. I didn’t win the race, but my team would not have won without me.

History is a relay. This moment in our nation’s history is a relay and we are the runners. I do not win or lose on my own. You do not win or lose on your own. But we must, each of us, hold our ground, give our best, do our job.

When we do, when we keep our eyes fixed on the prize, when we run the race, each of us, with everything we have, not giving up, pushing hard until the end, we will win.

We will win.

Chastened, humbled, wiser, better

Chastened, humbled, wiser, better

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There is nothing good about this global coronavirus pandemic. There is nothing good about people dying. There is nothing good about people losing their jobs. There is nothing good about cherished cultural institutions being put in jeopardy.

And yet, I pray that good may come out of it, that when the disease has run its course, when social distancing is no longer required, when we return to offices and schools and theaters and restaurants and sporting arenas and concert halls, we will not be the same, we will not simply return to business as usual.

I pray we may be changed: chastened, humbled, wiser, better.

May we be chastened, newly conscious of our vulnerability, recognizing that we cannot bend this world to suit our own purpose and pleasure no matter how smart or powerful or wealthy we fancy ourselves.

May we be humbled, acknowledging the limitations of our capacity to take care of ourselves, the frailty of our most prized institutions, whether governmental, economic, technological, or medical. May we be simply and profoundly grateful for life at all, for each moment, for each breath.

May we be wiser, cognizant of the frivolity of so many of our passions and pursuits, not abandoning ambition or aspiration, but keeping all these in perspective, remembering what it is that does matter: faith and hope and love.

May we be better, fully comprehending, not merely in our minds, but in our hearts and bodies, too, that we and our fellow human beings, near and far, are not competitors in a zero-sum game, but colleagues, companions, housemates, siblings, we and they children of God alike, we in need of them, they in need of us.

As we face this ordeal together, may we be patient, kind and generous, hopeful, faithful, grateful, and eager … eager for the dawning of the day when this pandemic will be a threat no more, but eager too for the dawning of a new goodness, in us and among us.

Dancing to the music

Dancing to the music

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From Steven Hayward’s sermon this morning at St. Francis by the Sea Episcopal Church, quoting a friend and colleague …

Hope is like hearing the music of the future … and faith is dancing to the music.