Spring Track is cancelled.
It’s a classic sales technique: the take away. The sales person takes the object of desire away. Suddenly the customer craves it and will pay big time. You don’t know how important something is, how much you want something, how much value you place on something until it’s taken away. The difference here is no amount of money, no negotiating will bring it back. My son, Dylan Wilbur, was last year’s Glendale News-Press Athlete of the Year. Now, his senior track season is cancelled. There won’t be another one, not in high school, not for my son, ever.
Don’t tell me how others have it worse. Don’t cite for me a worse tragedy. Don’t tell me, don’t tell me, shut up, not today. “Pity party. Table for one. Right this way, Mr. Wilbur.” “That looks very much like my house.” “It is.” – I’m going to squeeze every last drop of anguish out of this moment. I earned it.
I go for a run. Get away from that pain; get away from what’s happening and what can’t be undone. And on that run, a wee small voice from within speaks in the most loving, caring way, “I am so sorry.” The tears begin, fat splatters at first, then an ugly cry. I double over. The sobs suffocate my breath. The voice wraps around me, unable to make it better, but staying with me nevertheless.
So that’s that.
Here’s to all those parents out there behind all those high school runners. The ones who get up at 5:30 in the morning on those double session days.
I stumble into the kitchen. I can do it in my sleep, because I am. Toasted bagel no butter, that’s breakfast. Turkey sandwich, apple, carrots in his lunch container. Fill water bottle. Son shuffles in, running gear on, school clothes and towel crammed in a sports bag. In silent choreography we move, quick hug, “Love you,” “You too,” and he disappears into the darkness.
Here’s to all that training, starting at Mammoth for the high altitude, a never to be forgotten camping extravaganza, 25 boys and 25 girls camping together, along with a small group of parents to prepare the meals and drive the kids from their double work out sessions, to the icy creek soaks, to fun diversions in Yosemite.
Here’s to the track season, the Cool Breeze Invitational at Brookside Golf Course, the Mt. SAC Invitational, the Cross Country State Meet at Woodward Park in Fresno, the Meet of Champions at Azusa Pacific, the CIF events, and the California State Meet in Fresno. Lots of driving, lots of sitting in the stands watching dozens of runners I have no idea who they are, then finally those precious few minutes watching my own son run.
I spot him with the wild, blond hair and tall, lanky body. With a nonchalant gait, he enters the field. I watch him through his warm ups, chit chatting with others around him, an occasional laugh, then up to the race line, hand shakes all around, heeding the instructions from the guy holding the starter pistol, take his mark, set…BANG! And they’re off.
I’ve seen easily a hundred races by now. I know by heart his running strategy. He jumps into the lead at the beginning, then 200 meters in he’s got company, as the pack establishes a pace for this 4-lap, one mile race. By the third lap there is now a small pack of 2, 3 maybe even 5 boys up front, the rest are back aways. Someone picks up the pace, it’s a game of poker and your body are your chips. Someone keeps raising the ante. Are you in or not? Each boy must decide. My son is all in.
By the gun lap for the CIF Southern Section Division 1 title race, it’s down to 2 boys rounding that last 200 meters. Who has a kick left? And, oh my, does it get exciting. The crowd’s roar crescendoes. The runners’ faces are pure agony; the form is getting sloppy; the eyes burn with intense focus on that finish line.
Dylan crosses the finish line, arms up in victory. I check the clock and lodge in my head a new PR. The look in his eye is delirium, unfocused, probably hardly knows his name. He stumbles to a stop, bends over, hands to the knees, head down, spits to the side, rib cage heaving. Others around him collapse to the ground, some burst into tears, another heads for the nearest garbage can and pukes Gatorade.
I am disbelieving and so proud.
There was another time – ok, forgive me while I wax nostalgic, can you blame me? – when he won the 2018 Cool Breeze. That race is the Lalapalooza of races, music blaring, food trucks rumbling, crowds swarming. By the time these boys race, it’s late at night, the trail is beat up, flag lines down, people wandering dangerously across the trail while the race is in progress. The beginning is a sight to see: 300 boys at the starting line, 50 lines, side by side, 6 boys deep and as the gun fires, a stampede zooms forward into a quickly narrowing funnel, and yes, some do get trampled. This 5k is basically three loops so spectators get to easily keep track of how the race is progressing.
Dylan hangs with the front bunch, and into the final 100 meters, with a sharp turn at the last 50 meters, he’s trailing this one guy, so I’m thinking second place. Great. I turn to see the boys round the 50 and, oh my god, that’s my son in front! I’m screaming. He’s sprinting, as if towards me, to the finish line. And with 10 meters left, I see this smile spread across his face, his eyes entirely open and focused and euphoric. His arms fling out wide as he crosses the finish. I nudge my way through the mob over to him. He is bent over. I place my hand on his back. He stands up. I hug him tight, soaking in his sweat, and say to him, “Great job. I am so proud of you.”
Now the track is silent. Chained and padlocked, abandoned and useless, I stare at it. I see phantoms of runners tall and proud at the beginning, elbowing their way through the pack, gasping for air heading around the last lap, then leaning into the finish line.
Someone might ask, why are they trying so hard? And isn’t that a question about life, why do we try so hard? We don’t just stop at survival, we strive to excel, to master what we do.
Because inside there is this amazing feeling of accomplishment, of looking back and going, I did that, I just improved my time by 10 seconds or 1 second or .5 seconds. It’s addictive, and you want to do it again. You want to improve. You want to see what you can do. It gets you out of bed.
When it’s all taken away, when all has to stop just so we can survive, does it make track season look silly? Does it make sports look silly?
We are genetically encoded to respond to the underdog story, to triumph amidst overwhelming odds. Check out the Easter story which rises once again soon. The ultimate underdog triumphs over death. And perhaps that’s what great moments in sport offer: a touch of the divine for all to behold and whisper to their children one day that they were there when it happened, that in some way puts the foot on the throat of Death and says, “Ha, beat ‘cha!”
So how do you raise a Golden Boy who blows away your highest expectations. I kept thinking don’t worry, the time will come, he will fail and then you will deliver the lesson about how failure makes you a better person, you just get up, learn from your mistakes and keep going. But that shoe never dropped, until it did. This ashen Shoe dropped from the sky and smashed everything in sight, a deus ex machina in reverse wreaking failure, havoc and death in Biblical proportion.
Go ahead, Mr. Big shot dad, render that lesson now.