It was like flying with the geese or swimming with the dolphins.

 So, as is my want, I ride a bike. We live on a defunct golf course, a victim of golf’s waning popularity and a global pandemic. The bad news is the course is ill-maintained and nobody plays golf. The good news is the cart path remains and nobody plays golf, i.e. the old cart path = my new bike path. We live near the 4th green. The course is on 46 acres. There is an open field of another 30 or so to the east. A rudimentary cattle fence separates the two.

I ride mainly on the front nine. Most days I do between 6 and 8 miles of streets and cart paths. The course has a few ponds. I see lots of wildlife, mostly common birds and now and again migratory birds, rabbits, and ground hogs. Hawks circle the course looking for mice. We have a few canada geese and one day I even got to see some fledglings on one of the practice greens near the old clubhouse accompanied by their parents.

Even though the course is no longer mowed by the owners, the city sends a crew out once or twice a year to knock down the weeds. Home owners also tend to migrate out onto the course to keep the grass down around their area. This summer, right before the city dispatched a crew, the grass had begun to get out of hand. Wildlife started appearing along the cart path as they were hidden by the three to four foot grass and the path made a nice highway to use from location to location. As I would make a turn onto a curve on the path, I’d see rabbits hopping in front of me and then plunging into the high grass. The ground hog sat up as I approached, looked at me and began to scurry out in front and jumped off when he realized I was moving along pretty good.

One nice day I approached the 4th tee area which is contiguous to the open field to the east. It narrows there between the road and the field with the cart path the only way through to the tee area. I had my head down and I was cranking out 13 mph on the gps speed-o. The grass to my left between the cart path and the roadway was 3-4 feet high. I heard rustling to my left and turned my head to see a deer’s eye looking back at me at the same level. She was running, having gotten flushed by my approach, neck and neck with my bike. She didn’t need to look my way, her eyes look to the side but it was clear she was attempting to clear the area. The street was to her left and I was to her right and the only way clear was straight ahead. She was motoring alongside me at my speed. I looked at her running alongside me, not four feet away. Our heads were side to side and I was looking straight into her eye. It was like flying with the geese or swimming with the dolphins. I was bicycling with a running deer, one of the herd. We ran neck and neck for what seemed like a long time but at 20 feet per second, it couldn’t have been more than 2-3 seconds and she popped it into overdrive, jumped ahead, leaped the cart path directly in front of me and then leaped the fence to go back to the adjacent open field. Bang, bang... bang. Instantly moving alongside me and just as quickly, up, up and away. A silent departure . I had not altered my speed one iota. As I rode, I shook my head and tried to look to the right but the experience was over, forever. Off I went on my way and off she went on hers.

Like most of us in the 2020s, I wanted something electronic to share on social media to prove it happened. Stop the deer and ask for a selfie. But I learned two things:

1. I do not have nor will I ever have the juice to match up with a deer. 

2. What makes this encounter amazing is that it shouldn't have happened, see #1. 

All I have is the memory of looking into that deer's eye and realizing we were moving in a serendipitous synchronicity. That'll have to be enough.

"Cool Hand Luke" is an allegory

 Cool Hand Luke is an allegory.

Luke is the cog that wasn’t machined accurately. The chain-gang prison and the society it represents, is the machine he doesn’t fit.

Luke is an everyman who values his individualism over “striving for success.” What he’s learned so far in his thirty-something years is he has low value cards in his poker hand. No way to win, at least conventionally. He tires of that convention. He begins to question everything he hears. It sounds like he has been set up to lose. He tends to sneer at things that make him a loser. He lives in a society that only understands and values winning by the rules. Choosing to believe that he has free will, he decides not to play by other’s rules. He’s sick of losing. He self medicates with alcohol and for amusement decapitates parking meters. It’s not that he can’t understand what is being asked of him, he just can’t and won’t answer yes any more. For him, so much of what he sees and is asked to comply with, is arbitrary anyway. Who says so? So he rebels.

His token act of rebellion, the destruction of public property, earns him society’s recognition. It’s a society that can’t tolerate Luke’s non-conformity any more than he can tolerate the daily arbitrariness of life. He will need to stop thinking so much. Luke now qualifies for “re-education.” The prison represents modern society’s “school.” To the machine, Luke non-conforms in an arbitrary manner. If the rules say he loses, well he loses. The only place for him is behind a fence, in a box, until he learns to quit questioning the fiat of society. Cogs do not question why. They work at fitting in a slot. The Captain becomes Luke’s anti-teacher. His stick-carrying anti-mentor. Society, represented by The Captain must unteach Luke’s endless jobbing of the rules. Learn to stop questioning everything and looking for solutions. He is a “problem.” For that, Captain has his “rules.” No grab-ass and keep track of your spoon.     [see: Errata, below]

Society has no place for anybody who can’t manage to hold on to their spoon. Luke’s a fork person, it seems. That won’t do. Non-conformists need to be isolated and when necessary, beaten senseless. “Lessons” are unnecessary. Rules override them. Otherwise, others will begin to believe society’s rules are arbitrary, capricious and sometimes meaningless. Start thinking for themselves? Nonsense. Besides, non-conformists can’t be reintegrated, thinking society is a self-perpetuating, meaningless exercise in conformity. Luke’s spirit must be broken, his fork replaced with a spoon. Then he won’t need to be locked up any more. That can get expensive. He will be “rehabilitated.” He will get his mind “right.” Cleansed of useless, non-productive thought. The irony of the message, which is also the point, is those minority of humans who reject the conforms of society will be punished until their spirit is broken and their mind cleansed. “Rules Learned.” “Mission Accomplished.” 

Society neither requires nor desires independent thought. Just the opposite. It requires obedience. Ultimately Luke is broken. His body, while robust, ultimately can’t stand up to the relentlessness of society’s machine. Slowly, Luke capitulates and becomes No Eyes fetch-dog. He is the one man Luke respects. No Eyes is Death. There is no winning or losing, only a bolt of lightning that brings peace. But Luke is Luke and in time, his rebel core regenerates and, once again, he decides to escape, knowing it's his last time. The ultimate irony of “failure to communicate.” He is a thinking man. The man/cog who refuses to fit into the place society requires of him. He is what the machine must avoid: ignis spiritus chao. The only way to excommunicate a hard case like Luke is to cancel his ability to reason. Ultimately Luke welcomes it. He’d rather be sacrificed than lobotomised. He raises his arms, the anode to No Eyes cathode and in a flash, Luke is transformed. He has made his final escape.

Errata:

Cool Hand Luke (1967) movie script

by Donn Pearce and Frank Pierson.
Based on the novel by Donn Pearce.

[excerpt]

Floorwalker Carr’s speech, for all newcomers

“Them clothes has got laundry numbers 
    on 'em.You remember your number and 
    always wear the ones that has your number.

 Any man forgets his number 
    spends a night in the box.

(passes out spoons)

    

This yere spoon you keep with you 
    and any man loses his spoon spends a 
    night in the box.

There is no playing 
    grabass or fighting in the building. 
    You got a grudge against another man 
    you can fight him Saturday afternoon. 
    Any man playing grabass or fighting 
    in the building spends a night in 
    the box.

First bell is at five minutes 
    of eight when you will get in your 
    bunk and last bell is at eight...
    Any man not in his bunk at eight 
    will spend a night in the box.

There 
    is no smoking in prone position in 
    bed. To smoke you must have both 
    legs over the side of your bunk. 
    Anyone caught smoking in prone 
    position will spend a night in the 
    box.

You get two sheets. Every 
    Saturday you put the clean sheet on 
    the top, the top sheet on the bottom 
    and the bottom sheet you turn in to 
    the Laundry Boy. Any man who turns 
    in the wrong sheet spends a night in 
    the box.

No one will sit on the bunks 
    with dirty pants on. Any man sitting 
    on a bunk with dirty pants will spend 
    a night in the box.

Any man who don't 
    bring back his empty pop bottles 
    spends a night in the box.

Any man loudtalking spends a night 
    in the box.

You got questions you 
    come to me.
    I'm Carr, the floorwalker. I'm 
    responsible for order in here and 
    any man that don't keep order...
    ...spends a night in the box.
       

(to Cool Hand Luke, sincerely)

    I hope you ain't gonna be a hardcase.”

by the time we were some six or seven blocks down 32nd Street, the first (bus stop sign) was clanging its way past our location, being dragged behind a pickup truck on a length of steel chain

So I became Safety Director of Louisiana Transit Co., Inc. in late 1975. Our Operations Manager, Byron Kohoutek (like the comet, if you’re old enough) believed in training incoming office employees as regular bus operators. No heads-up to the lead operators who did the training. You were just another bus driver-hire thrown into the mix. I learned a lot. The Operators filled my ears with tips and tricks. One such Operator, Sam Ford, impressed me with his conscientiousness. He wanted me to learn all the bus stops out on the highway before I was on my own in regular revenue service. He told me that he did it by requesting a written copy of the bus stop list from the office, in this case for Airline Hwy. Taking his own time, after hours, in his POV, to ride up and down the highway and memorize where each stop was located. He said the office did a pretty poor job of putting up bus stop signs, so you were pretty much on your own. I learned about running “hot” (early). How to signal across the street to other operators how hot you were. Sam didn’t run hot but he explained why other operators were holding up fingers across the way. I got yelled at, cursed, and threatened for not stopping my bus in the middle of the road to let people on by belligerent passengers. Drunks dribbled pieces of transfers into the fare box instead of cash. We had to roust other drunks to get off at the end of the line. I could never drive fast enough to keep the schedule much less run hot but Sam said it would come in time.

I learned that Sam was conscientious.

I also learned the office needed to procure more bus stop signs and go out on the highway and put them up.

For that, we used a pickup truck, a 6 foot aluminum step ladder, nine foot long, dark green painted steel posts with mounting holes up and down, nuts, bolts, lock washers and a very heavy, cast steel, cylindrical post driver that had handles on each side, weighted at the closed end. Oh, and a collection of narrow yellow fiberglas bus stop signs with BUS STOP screen printed in paint running longitudinally with holes drilled strategically to match the holes in the steel posts. It was a two man job. One office weenie, me and one shop worker, in this case our utilityman,TJ Howard. TJ was analogous to a blocking tight end. Big, strong, powerful, tough. He was gentle, taciturn, confident and reliable as rain in the afternoon in New Orleans. His hands were toughened from years of changing tires. I wore gloves.

The bus line with the sorriest set of signs was the Kenner Loop, a kind of bastard bus line we ran under contract with the City of Kenner. Most of the lines we operated traditionally made enough income from fare payment to cover their operating costs. The company ran charters for profit while the core transit lines covered basic expenses. The Loop was a dog. Kenner paid us $35 an hour (in 1975 dollars) to cover the meandering loop of the city with two buses in service. It was a 90 minute loop with a 45 minute headway. What little fares we collected also went to cover expenses.

I picked the Loop for the initial sign blitz because bus stop signs were few and far between in Kenner. Bus stops were spaced every other block. Sometimes we nailed them onto telephone poles and when no pole was near an intersection we drove a post and mounted a sign. One guy opened the step ladder and center positioned contiguous to the designated stop location. He then went all the way to the top of the ladder and sat facing perpendicular. The other guy placed the bottom of the post directly on the ground at the mounting point (to be the bottom), laid it down all the way, slid the post driver over the other end (to be the top) and then walked it upright to 90 degrees. At that point, the guy sitting on top the ladder took the handles of the post driver and began wanging away, up and down and up and down, using the weighted end of the post driver to drive the post down some 2 feet (1/2 inch at a time) until it was properly set. You had to leverage your feet on the steps to generate torque. Then opposing signs were mounted on the post and the screw ends of the bolts damaged to prevent removal.

Anyway, by the time we were some six or seven blocks down 32nd Street in Kenner, having driven three or four posts with signs, the first one was clanging its way past our location, being dragged behind a pickup truck on a length of steel chain. Somebody didn’t want the stop near their home and was giving us the finger as he drove by us pulling the sign behind his truck. At this point TJ began to jump up and down and scream. He ran into the street and began to de-pants himself, slapping his thighs and sitting down in the street to remove his boots so he could get his pants all the way off. His legs were crawling with red fire ants. We had driven a post into an area with resident fire ants and they had crawled into his pants while he held the post steady. The bite of one fire ant brings tears to the eyes. Did we quit? Did TJ say “enough?” Was it hot? You bet. Was TJ hurt and embarrassed? Yes. Did it slow TJ down? No. We proceeded to cover every bus stop sign on the Eastbank of Jefferson Parish over the next few weeks. I had to purchase dozens more signs. Signs disappeared at a rate of one or two per month from each bus line (souvenirs?) so we had to stay the battle but soon we added a column to the bus stop printed list. It was headed: “Posted” with brackets for a check mark. 

For one brief shining moment in 1976, all the brackets bore check marks:

Check mark = TJ

TJ =The Man  

What happens when you can't run as fast as an old, fat, diabetic.

 What reduces stress?

Running

What about walking, biking, swimming, playing a musical instrument, petting an animal, hugging a cow, etc?

Fine. There are other ways.

We can beg the question but today we’re here to praise running, not bury it.

Running (jogging?) reduces stress, weight and blood pressure and it is a mood elevator.

My story:

In my early 20's, D.I.s at Lackland got me into shape. It was mandatory, eh?

We ran every day in basic training (at least we were supposed to) and at the end of six weeks we ran 1.5miles in under 15 minutes. 1970 style baseline fitness. Our D.I. didn't run us for a few days and then upped the time and mileage so we'd suffer at the beginning. What can I say? In any case we eventually adapted and got it done.

Thereafter we were (supposedly) running each year to re-qualify that time.

I say (supposedly) because we cheated.

After four years, I mustered out and didn’t need to cheat any more.

In my late 20s, early 30s my weight gradually climbed and my overall health declined while my BP rose.

I was working a stressful job and spent a large part of my day at a desk.

Post military, I had slacked off and gradually became unhealthy.

Once I realized my health was declining, I tried getting up earlier and going out and jogging. Kinda like going back to Basic.

For me, getting up earlier than I had to was unsustainable. I could do it a for a couple days but long term, I just rolled over and reset the clock.

The other alternative, post-work exercise wasn’t much better. By the end of the day, I was exhausted and exercise was not going to happen.

That left the only other free time I had in a nine hour day, that was the noon hour.

I visited the local gym and played pickup basketball. I read about the New Orleans Corporate Cup, a 5K race downtown. I decided to jog. I could run around the gym a few times and then get out of breath. To improve my fitness I quit the basketball, which was half court and began jogging. The Canadian Air Force fitness standards and the understanding of aerobics and target pulse rates were all now basically standards for fitness. I read the books and applied the science and logic. We worked near the Mississippi River levee and I started trying to run the half mile to the levee and then out and back on the levee. In time, after weeks and weeks, my lungs gradually expanded and I could run without stopping for a mile. My initial goal was to unofficially re-qualify for the AF yearly fitness test. It then became a kind of “my time.” Changing out to running shoes and shorts at noon and hitting the road was something I looked forward to. Not just running to relieve stress but running away from it, eh? The Times Picayune began running articles in the sports section about getting in shape, having goals and running in local average joe/jill races. Lots of 5Ks and 10Ks with tee shirts. My kid’s schools had fun runs. It was faddish. I began to lose weight and get a lot more healthy. It took time and effort but like I said, I started looking forward to it. I increased my distance and reduced my time.

Then my goal was to compete in the Corporate Cup with a team of four from our organization. In time, sometimes with friends like Terry and Jerry I ran a half mile to the Mississippi River levee, two miles out and two miles back and then the half mile back to work. We worked up to that over a couple of years so that we could maintain the Air Force standard 10 minute mile and run the five miles in under an hour and then go back to work. The 5K was 3.1 miles so the daily 5 mile run was overkill but we liked doing it anyway. I ran in all kinds of weather. I have a malignant melanoma (excised) to show for my years of running the direct sun without a tee shirt, which I would strip off after leaving work. Over thirty years I ran over 22,000 miles. Never more than 7 miles at a time. When I got a noticeable limp, I bought new shoes.

So that intro leads me a valuable learning experience that I wanted to share.

While all this was progressing I read another book on health and fitness. It was by Dr. Nathan Pritikin. It was in the news in GNO because our local Sheriff Harry Lee was overweight and wanted to improve his health. He enrolled in the Pritikin system fat camp and went away for a few weeks. We all read about Harry’s visit in the local papers. I read the book because reading about aerobics and fitness had really benefited me.

I’ll condense Dr. Pritikin’s book for you. Eat mostly unleavened pita bread and seaweed, avoid potato peelings, drink lots of water and run your ass off and you can lose a ton of weight and throw away your high blood pressure medicine. It was a miracle cure for obesity and type 2 diabetes. Anyway, coterminously, I’m running on the levee everyday. For a while I fluctuated with 12, then 11 minute miles and finally could do consistent 10 minute miles. Early on I couldn’t maintain it for the whole five miles but I was encouraged. 10 minute miles, while not exactly fast was well, respectable, at least for a slub like me. Or so I thought.

Dr. Pritikin relayed the story of a 60-ish fat guy who was on death’s door who visited his camp and ate pita bread and seaweed and drank water and began to jog every day. In a few weeks he was able to run a mile in just under 6 minutes. This obese diabetic: was running 6 minute miles. He’s 60 something. I’m 32. I read it again. I began to realize I wasn’t trying hard enough. I needed to pick up my game or be shamed by fat, old, newly healthy, guys.

I resolved to stop doing distance and concentrate on intervals and to improve my time. My shame was real.

Now for the fun.

On the levee there are 1/5 mile markers but I also got a speedo for my bicycle and over a few days marked off pretty accurate mile markers. I marked a start and finish line for my mile quest which coincided with the levee markers. This was around 1980+, so no gps time and mileage aids, unless you were military and had very expensive equipment.

The weather was decent and I pre-hydrated. I warmed up by jogging the half mile to the levee and spotted myself at the start mark. I got a Timex Ironman (or something like for the time). I took off and went for it. No more aerobics for me. Anaerobics would be the new order of the day. I took a minute off my 10 minute mile. I did 9 minutes. I stared at my time for a long time. Something wasn't computing. I was pushing and running but I was slow. Real slow. The next day I ran harder and so on and so on. Eventually, my time dipped down into the medium 8’s. But hey, I was way, way away from a 6 minute mile. Something was off here. I lived in a different universe from the 60 year old, fat diabetic who casually ran off a 6. I needed more motivation, it seemed. Eat more pita. Something. Did I question Nathan Prinkin’s writing? Well, yes, I did. But looking at what other's achieved, a 6 minute mile wasn’t particularly fast. I could doubt Pritikin but I needed to pick up my game.

Thus began “the quest.” Days of 8:40s, then 8:20s, etc. This was not fun. I lost weight. I worked on exercises. I ran under 8 minutes, into the 7's. Weeks went by. Now reducing my time by 5-10 seconds per mile required pain. That's right, pushing and pushing rewarded me with 5 seconds. I cursed Nathan Pritikin and the old, fat guy. It was really hard in the dead of summer. When it got hot, pushing yourself to limits was well, dangerously stupid. Luckily, I was an all season runner and once summer was over, I could begin to push again.

What worked? The only thing that got me over the hump to push myself beyond the threshold of oxygen debt was fiction. I began to motivate myself that random thieves and murderers were closing in on my wife and kids and their very existence was predicated on me reaching down to rush to their aid. There were many days I rode a bicycle against the wind in the mud and rain on the levee (before it was paved) that I just forced myself to do it. Physically it was very, very hard. Mentally it was harder. The same was true of getting my time down to 6 minutes. I got closer and closer in decent weather and one day, after months and months of trying my times did drop into the 6’s and my best was 5:53. There were weeks when I was in the 7’s. It needed to be a good conditions day. Of course my 5K times dropped based on the interval training. My best 5K was 26 flat. Not great, eh? Runners are special people. I am a jogger. I can run but my times and attitude is that of a jogger. Nowhere in high school did I realize that people who ran track had to build up their lung power over weeks and months of training. I just didn’t know. I know now.

Is there a moral? For me the “exercise” of challenging myself to find a time, place and distance to run changed my life. I wish I could convey to others what I felt like before I started to exercise and what I felt like after a few years of daily running. It requires decent shoes and running on grass or other soft surfaces saves on joint ache. But overall running helps you mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and of course, physically.

Can’t run? Walk. Bicycle. Swim. Skate. Your body is a dynamic system. Made to move. Make it move. It will improve your health and your attitude. You will sleep better (assuming you cut back on caffeine after noon). The chore is to set aside a time to do it and then prioritize it. If you find it isn’t getting done, then adjust what you are doing and when. Keep trying until something sticks. If you need friends to help you get motivated, fine. Ultimately it is up to you. What you do is less important than scheduling it daily and doing it. It is as important as breathing, sleeping, drinking and eating. Exercise, daily exercise, will change and improve you. Count on it. Do it at lunch. Tell the boss your doctor recommended it for your health. Write it down somewhere and keep writing it until it’s done. Then tell others. Advocate for health and wellness.

Be your own hero.

Fail if you must, but fail at trying. Fail at trying...

Every day