I've wanted, and needed, to write about this for a long time. I kept taking the high road, and didn't. But I think it's time.
I waffled, as I have on many mornings, then decided that today, I would ride my bike to work.
The air was unusually cool and fresh for mid-May, mid-rush hour.
My heart was still heavy, as it's been lately, but there was the promise of the two-mile downhill ride on Lamar Boulevard, the feel of speed and wind and release, and I felt it there waiting to comfort me, like my girlfriend had when she hugged me goodbye earlier this morning.
I cranked up the short hill out of the back of my apartment complex, up to the street that would take me to Lamar. As I crested the hill, a silver Toyota pickup swept past. Cones in the bed, and that logo on the back.
You've got to be kidding me. Here? Now?
It was the leader of the group I once coached for. A group I had loved, given almost unblinking loyalty to, and worked hard for, a group that quickly and unceremoniously fired me a year and a month ago, for a mistake I had made. It was a bad mistake, a moment's ethical failure that had consequences for another person. I had done everything I could to lessen that burden, to make up for what I had done. It had consequences and a burden for me, in remorse and a deep need to be better and do far more good than I had tried to do before.
Notably, it was a mistake in my personal life, that didn't impact my role as a coach, except this group, and this woman in the silver Toyota truck, decided it was their business, decided it required that they fire me, in the middle of a training group I coached, days before another group was set to continue with a new class, because the runners had asked to continue training with me, specifically, and in the middle of a group I myself was training with.
There was an appeal. There was a polite refusal. A week later, I was laid off my job. A week after that, I was told that I would not be coaching for a great group that trained cancer patients and survivors.
People turned their backs on me. Notably, people who rallied around one person and his odd little cult of personality. Someone I had stuck up for, tried to be a friend to, who wouldn't ever answer me when I asked if he was the one who had said something, that had set the wheels in motion to get me fired.
Only a couple of people had the respect to ask me for my side. Some may have felt they chose against someone who had made a mistake. But I know that many felt they were faced with a choice between the group they loved so much, that was such a tremendous part of their running and social lives, and me.
There was a slide, and a long, dark time. It was with me every day.
For so much of my life, when I had little other self-esteem to hold on to, I had the comfort of knowing that I tried to be a good person, and essentially was. I knew that other people knew that, and believed in me at least to that extent.
Suddenly, I didn't have that. I had failed, and nothing can ever erase that failure. And there seemed to be nothing I could do to make up for it. I was cast out, and that was it.
It all makes me feel like I'm right back in the days when bullies ruled my world, inflicting wounds inside and out, with no repercussions, no consequences for their themselves. I know, in some larger sense, in a very essential way, they're losing, not winning. I know that now. But then, and now, the worst of it is, I know they think that they're winning.
There were months and months of not being able to run without feeling the hurt and anger. The impact of bottom, the hands of friends, and the drive to coach and run again finally pulled me up. But I could never forget, and it continues to burn in me.
It doesn't help that their running group is huge, and growing, and loud, and everywhere in this town. Good for them. Bad for me. I see them around the races and the streets. Many of the coaches continue to be friends, really good ones, even. I get fake hellos from just a few, if they don't have the option of completely ignoring me.
The rep that helped us get shirts for our new running group even said the other day she can't do it anymore, because she was told I had split off from this other group, and she doesn't want to risk the connection. I don't blame her at all, and I don't know that it's a real action by the other group. But it's just another intrusion.
And now here she is, in my neighborhood, right in front of me on a ride to work that I'd hoped would make me feel a bit better today.
I'm sitting right behind her at the light. There aren't any options, and while I don't have to engage a bully, I'm not going to run from them, either. I know she sees me. Her dog is hanging out the passenger window, I focus on it, and the light. I turn onto Lamar behind her, and all thoughts of a leisurely ride and arriving at work not completely bathed in sweat are overwhelmed by this surge of... everything.
I fall back initially. Then it's quickly 20, 25, 30mph. A succession of lights and traffic slow-downs, and I'm just a couple of cars back again.
They expect me to forget and move on, and they seem befuddled by my failure to do so. But it's easy for them, isn't it? They hadn't lost anything. They got their way, and expect to continue getting their way.
I lost a lot. As a friend, they and some of their followers turned their backs on me. As a person who developed strong relationships and friendships with my runners, they gave me only the option of inexplicably quitting on them in the middle of their training, of a mysterious As a coach, they gave me nowhere to move on to. Two different parties place the blame on each other for it, but whichever of them is telling the truth, the bottom line is, I was prevented from coaching for another group.
When I sent an email to my runners telling them I had to quit "for personal reasons", but encouraging them to continue running with that establishment, they were upset that runners came to them with questions about why and requests that I continue.
When some of my runners who had become and still are my friends rallied around me and didn't want to see me slide into a hole, when they wanted to continue running with me, I first said yes, then decided it wasn't a good thing. I disclosed to the woman in the silver Toyota about it, and was met with anger.
When people came and ran with me anyway, she was infuriated. Attempts to talk, attempts at reconciliation, went unanswered. Finally, the other owner of the running group wanted to talk to me about concerns they had about my coaching a group and for my impact "on the running community in general". He did say some nice things. I want to believe some part of him was genuine and wanted to be helpful. But there was also arrogance, challenge. In the spirit of appeasement, I gave things up. They gave nothing.
They lay claim to workouts that other coaches tell me far predate them. They lay claim to anyone I met as a coach. They lay claim to my ability to coach.
After all this, they expect me to let go. They expect me to go away. They don't understand why I'm still angry. Sometimes, I don't, either. It's 8:10am on an unusually cool, mid-May Friday morning, and I'm pounding away at 35 miles an hour chasing... what?
I've ended up with some of the best friends and runners I've ever had, all of whom know the truth, and made their own choices. One of them became someone I love. Of the runners that stuck with me, and the friends they brought into the new group, a couple were sidelined by injury. Everyone else made it to the marathon and half marathon, and I'm proud of playing a role in that as their coach. More and more people are coming to me wanting me to coach them to run.
So why do I still feel the sadness and anger?
Trailing her truck down Lamar this morning, out of breathing and the smooth motion of leg pushing bike, reasons began to rise up out of the murkiness in my heart and head, taking on a new sharpness in the grey morning light.
I am sad, I am angry, I am devoid of resolution, because for these people I'm beyond forgiveness or redemption. My mistakes, my flaws, regardless of my willingness to acknowledge them, repent for them, or change them, make me forever less to them. And this means one, or both, of two things: either I'm not worth it to them, and never really was, or they don't have the capacity or general willingness.
It would be easy, me being who I am, with my history of being told I wasn't good enough, that I was something less, to believe that. But I believe in the quality of the friends and the people who have stuck by me, through this and so much else. They're good people, true people, who, when I might have disappointed or failed them or someone else, or even myself, trusted the person they believed me to be. They ask me for the truth. They trust that the person I am wants to be good, and will try to do the right things. They reward faith with faith, the heart of true and meaningful loyalty and friendship. And not only because I need that faith from time, that ability in them is part of what makes them the greatest friends, and the greatest people.
These great people believe I'm worthwhile. They believe I'm worth their faith and their friendship. That's enough for me.
So, I've known it's not that. Zipping downhill on Lamar, trailing my past in the silver Toyota truck, I realized that it is the other thing, that on top of the fact that I failed them, it's the fact that these people failed me, and themselves, and their ideals.
We both failed. We all failed. Unfortunately, having their company on the way down just makes me feel worse. The question at this point, is... what will we do now? Who will we be today, tomorrow? Will we both continue to fail?
She split off to the right at Mary Street. I thought of following. It would be shorter, there'd be less traffic, and yes, I wanted to hang on, I wanted to be there in her rear view mirror, I wanted to see a smile and forgiveness, or I wanted her to see me - I am still here, I am still good. I am still worth a damn. I will not run from you.
I paused, fingers on the shifter. Then I pushed the small lever in, urged my legs on a bit, and stayed to the left. The air was unusually cool and fresh for mid-May and mid-rush hour. The drivers around me were understanding and accomodating. And there was a smooth, fast downhill ahead, waiting.
