Be Wrong and be Born to Run

Oh yes, pile it on. Tell me when you see me, write me when you read this. Say it. I know, I’m wrong. Woefully wrong. Wrong like having a dogma enema. Someday I will get over this, but this one remains life-changing. It isn’t like I haven’t been wrong before. Despite being told repeatedly how great I am, I do have to admit being wrong once. Maybe twice.

In all seriousness this latest misconception was only realized by a pure gamble. Let me describe this gamble.

I like bookstores. I really do. They are very calming for me and often times I find it fun just to wander and look at the titles. Call me a geek. Books have always brought me joy, so much that I now find myself slightly on edge when I am about to make a purchase, wondering if the book will be good, or so bad I hurl it against the wall like I did for Twilight. As a voracious reader, I have finished many of the classics, moderns and everything in between that is considered a good recommendation. Picking up a book recommended by somebody is easy work, as you can blame them for something terrible. However, when perusing alone, one is fully responsible for their own actions and buying a book by an unknown author on a favorite subject can be a disaster. No offense to Joe Friel, but Jesus Christ, his books are like reading washing instructions on a shirt tag. Even my favorite subjects have been defecated on by substandard authors and I still haven’t forgave most of them.

This was my dilemma. I saw a book on the shelf titled Born to Run. This book advertised itself as an introspective and mysterious exposé into running and the Raramuri. Having some background of the Tarahumara, I was aware of their location and their lore. Many have compared the Navajo and the Apache to the Tarahumara (Raramuri), but this is fairly incorrect and leads to some silly stereotyping of the Native American populations. The lore is this: many old cultures have always had legends swirling around them of their superhuman running abilities. Be it the Kalahari, Kenyans, Tarahumara or even the Masai, stories find their way into our minds of their crazy abilities to run for tens of miles at a time through the most challenging terrain on the planet. This was not new for me. I have heard these stories and frankly most of them are bullshit disguised as a hook to get people to read the book. This cover was no different. I thought MacDougall’s hook was weak, and I wasn’t intrigued. However, I pulled the book off the shelf and read the inside flap. Blah, blah, blah, the Raramuri are great, run for hundreds of miles, blah, blah and they do it barefoot. Blah, blah…wait! Barefoot? No they don’t. Insert big red bullshit flag here. Wave it. Barefoot? In the Sierra Madres? Keep waving it. Now the gamble wasn’t such a gamble anymore. This book had my attention. However, the last thing I wanted was some Amnesty waa-waa eye crying about another poor part of the world. I know that already, and it depresses me to read anymore of it. But, against some reason, I put the book on the counter and purchased it.

Upon arriving home I flopped down on the couch and dove into Born to Run. Screw the MacDougall hook, I was going to give this one a chance. I suddenly realized MacDougall was not responsible for his cover hook. It must be some wannabe copy editor. Bitch. MacDougall was brilliant, and it all started from one statement: my foot hurts.

Since this isn’t a book review, I won’t bore you with the details. I will say that MacDougall wound evolution, athletics, fear, hope, plot, love, strife, and every other human emotion into a story about running. I was riveted. I laughed. I cried. I made the book an excuse not to sleep. It was powerful, it was moving and more than anything it taught me something.

It taught me I was wrong. It taught me that, despite my life philosophy, I was being a hypocrite and ignoring the obvious. How could thirty years of technology trump a million years of evolution? Why, with all of the data, did we ignore it? My answer is simple. We respond to what we know, and what we knew was to wear shoes. Why wouldn’t you wear shoes? Glass, nails, empty hypodermics…who knows what we could step on? It is a minefield out there! Compare, though, a cut foot to plantar fasciitis. Which is worse? Our feet are meant to be unshod.

This does come with a caveat. I know I just wrote a diatribe on barefoot running, but I still will race in something. I have chosen the Vibram FiveFingers, since I would hate for a small nail or piece of glass to end a race. Welcome to the revolution.