Yesterday was one of the six special days in my family's year -- one of my kid's birthdays. But it was also the last 1.5 mile race before the championships for the city's private school kids this fall, and I had two entries.
The first was my 12-year-old "non-athlete" (his words). In fact, Dylan has always been able to fly when it comes to running. He seemed pretty loose pre-race, smiling and joking with his cohorts.
The other was the kid every coach tells me is a natural athlete, 14-year-old Aidan. He doesn't only fly; he is so fast none of my camera settings could catch what I witnessed yesterday. He's a competitor, and thus was nervous before the race.
As start-time approached, all the runners stretched.
The venue was KDBS, an elite private girls' school out near Land's End. My older daughters, Laila and Sarah Daisy, went there for several years in the '80s, so returning there triggered a ton of memories.
The little girls still wear the traditional green plaid uniforms my girls wore. The older girls wear a more informal blue and white uniform, unchanged for decades.
We'd gotten there very early, so before the race began I took a walk around the route the runners would be taking. Suddenly, I was face to face with a powerful memory, one that requires elaboration.
My Dad's favorite things in life, I think, were golfing and fishing. This is a shot of the fairway next to San Francisco Bay on the public golf course just above KDBS. When I took him there, during one of his visits to San Francisco, one of us (probably me) hit a ball that disappeared over the trees.
As we went to contemplate where it might have landed, we encountered a steep cliff down to the Pacific, churning far below.
This is Land's End.
My Dad probably told that story 1,000 times to his friends. I'd forgotten all about it until finding myself once again there yesterday.
Back at the school, I spotted a little street sign for the driveway onto the KDBS campus: "David Fleishhacker Way," honoring the Headmaster who was there when my girls attended. Another wave of nostalgia engulfed me. David was not only a great leader of this school, he was, like me and the girls' Mom, a former Peace Corps Volunteer in Afghanistan.
My first son Peter was a terrific runner. When he was a very little boy, maybe 3 or 4, long before he became the fastest 100-yard-dash kid in Marin County's middle schools, I found him building what looked like an airplane out of Legos one day in our flat on Ashbury Street.
"What's that?" I asked.
"A Fleishhacker," he replied.
All of a sudden, my memories had to give way to the present. The runners had to climb these steps three times and circle the school along the golf course and through city streets two times before re-entering the school grounds to reach the finish line.
My 14-year-old started off in the top 5 and my 12-year-old was in the top 20.
I awaited their arrival, as they were far out of sight, somewhere way out on that course.
Suddenly, two boys roared around the final turn and into sight. My 14-year-old Aidan racing with his friend, Jose, toward the finish line. No one else was near. He came across the ribbon as #2, a terrific performance. But, then, my little "non-athlete" showed up, finished strong as #18. All 17 runners ahead of him, like his big brother, were older, bigger, and by his definition, more "athletic."
I wasn't sure which one to be prouder of, so I decided just to be equally proud of both of them. I only wish my Dad could have witnessed this race.
After all of this (not to mention an intense workday before and then after all of this family activity), the day's main event took over. My youngest daughter Julia's tenth birthday! When I called her in the morning she said she definitely felt "older and bigger" when she woke up than she had felt the night before. (By today, these feelings had worn off. She said she didn't really feel any difference being ten.)
She chose the venue for her dinner party with her brothers and Mom and me: Chevy's downtown. We had a very nice dinner.
As I left the restaurant to retrieve my car and drive all them home to Bernal Heights, the downtown night spoke to me. It said something hard to discern, but what sounded like: "Memories matter, David. Family matters. Place matters. Keep telling strories like this one until you die."
So, maybe I will.
-30-
No comments:
Post a Comment