Below the Surface

“I used to be a musician.  I was in a band that was making a little noise in our local area but after a while it seemed like we were going nowhere, my bandmates and I started to fight, and every night we were at bars smoking cigarettes and drinking until the bar closed.  The whole musician lifestyle really started taking a toll on me mentally and physically, and one night I saw a video on Youtube about a one hundred-mile race in the Appalachian Mountains.  After seeing that video, I was hooked.  I began running on trails and eventually started running ultras.  That was four years ago, and I definitely like my new life a lot more than my former one”.  I sat and listened as Nathan continued to tell me his story about how he got into ultrarunning.  He was a young guy from North Carolina who looked to be in his mid-twenties with long blonde hair covered by a runner’s hat.  We shared a seat and traded stories as the school bus we were riding drove along the twisting mountain road towards Robinson Flat, the starting area of the Western States training run we were participating in that day.

I enjoyed hearing Nathan’s story.  It was much different than my journey into ultrarunning, but that was precisely why I was so engaged.  In fact, hearing other runners’ stories about their journey into this sport has become one of my favorite parts of running ultramarathons.  Every ultramarathon runner has a story to tell.  No one just wakes up one morning and says “I’m going to run fifty miles today” with no rhyme or reason to it.  Anyone who runs fifty miles has a unique story about what led them to that point, whether they realize it or not.  While running ultras, I engage in conversation with others, as most runners often do.  Some runners like to converse about their favorite races or races they’ve done, but I like to look deeper than that.  I want to know why they’re out here doing this.  This question often remains unanswered, but if it seems like the other runners are open to engaging in a deeper discussion, I’ll ask the one question that always allows me to get into their heads; “So, how did you get into ultrarunning in the first place?”  I’ve gotten a variety of different responses to this question over the years.  Some have been short and simple, others have been more in depth and personal.  Regardless of the response, I love hearing these stories.  Some runners prefer to keep to themselves during a race with little interest in interacting with others, but I’m the sheer opposite.  Why am I so intrigued by other people’s backgrounds?  Why do I always want to hear other people’s stories instead of keeping to myself?  Why do I live for this kind of human interaction during ultramarathons?  All valid questions.  The answer, in short, traces back to my childhood and my upbringing in the suburbs of Detroit.  Allow me to explain why.

Growing up in Michigan was an awesome experience.  We snowboarded and went sledding during the winter and sailed on the lake and swam at the community pool during the summer.  The Detroit area is a very interesting and unique place.  You will find every type of person imaginable.  All kinds of people from extremely wealthy to dirt poor.  Caucasian, African American, Middle Eastern, Hispanic, Asian, you name it.  Unfortunately, when I was growing up, there was a lot of tension between the different races and social-economic classes in the Detroit area.  This tension stemmed from the conservative views of the wealthy people clashing with the more liberal views of the minorities, along with the segregation of these different types of people within the neighborhoods and cities.  Compared to other major cities like Chicago, the Detroit metropolitan area is fairly small, which meant that although these different types of people were mainly segregated, they lived within close proximity of each other.  Sadly, the city of Detroit has been in a state of despair for many years.  There is no shortage of abandoned buildings and partially burned down houses with shattered windows and roofs caving in.  In addition to the urban decay that plagues the city, extreme poverty, unemployment, and high crime have been a major issue for decades.  As the 2002 movie “8 Mile” staring Eminem implies, eight-mile road is the dividing line between Detroit and the northern suburbs.  South of eight-mile road lies the struggling city of Detroit, while just across the road lies the northern suburbs of Hazel Park, Warren, and Eastpointe, which are in far better economic shape than Detroit.  As you travel north of Detroit, the mile roads increase in numerical value.  For instance, as you drive north, you’ll hit nine-mile road, then ten-mile road, etc.  Cities like Warren and Eastpointe extend as far north as twelve-mile road and along fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen-mile road lie the wealthy and affluent cities of Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, and Bloomfield Township.  Warren, Hazel Park, Eastpointe, and other cities in close proximity to the Detroit border are largely working-class neighborhoods and are better off than Detroit but are considerably less wealthy than Bloomfield Hills and Birmingham.  In fact, Bloomfield Hills is one of the most affluent cities in the State of Michigan and possibly the United States.  The fact that Bloomfield Hills is located less than a half-marathon’s distance from the Detroit city limits gives you a perspective of how close in proximity these different socio-economic classes are located within one another.  When I was a kid my Mom, sister, and I would occasionally volunteer at the Salvation Army, and one time we even visited a poor family in Detroit through a volunteer program during Christmas to donate some gifts.  During my high school years, I once volunteered at a homeless shelter and worked an overnight shift.  I sat and listened as people told me about their struggles, how they grew up, and how they ended up in their current situation.  I worked in a Greek restaurant for three years in high school.  Among the employees were adults as well as kids my age from more working-class neighborhoods.  They used to tell me stories about girls at their school getting pregnant, about their friends’ parents getting into physical altercations, and even kids getting arrested in their schools.  Growing up in Beverly Hills, Michigan, halfway between thirteen and fourteen-mile road, I hadn’t experienced anything like this, and I was intrigued by hearing about what these other kids had been through because it was drastically different than how I grew up.  Despite our different backgrounds, I formed friendships with these co-workers overtime and we even occasionally hung out together.  And all the people at the homeless shelter, the Salvation Army, and the poor family we visited at Christmas were so kind and appreciative of what we were doing.  They loved us, and I loved getting to know them and hearing their stories. 

Unfortunately, not everyone within the community shared this attitude.  There were some exceptions, but the general consensus was if you grew up north of thirteen-mile road in cities like Birmingham or Bloomfield Hills, you were basically viewed as a candy ass richie boy.  Growing up in Beverly Hills right near Birmingham, I fell into this category and I hated it.  The working-class community had a justifiable reason to adopt this mentality though.  Other kids at my school were not accepting of new kids who transferred to our school from poorer neighborhoods hoping for a better education.  Instead of talking to them, getting to know them, and looking below the surface, they would make snide comments about how these kids probably lived in trailers, about how they were dirty, poor, and even made inappropriate racial comments at times.  I remember being up at the Fireside Inn (The Fireside Inn is an awesome summer resort in Northern Michigan that deserves its own blog post, which will come at some point) and sitting around the bonfire by the lake one night with a group of kids around my age that I didn’t know.  “Where are you guys from?” I asked.  “Warren” they said.  “Nice, I’m from Beverly Hills” I said, not thinking anything of it.  One of the girls raised her eyebrows at me.  “Oh, you’re a rich kid” she sneered.  “Well, no.  Not really” I answered back.  She just nodded, looked me up and down and said “yeah, sure”.  There was also a time when a co-worker from the restaurant dropped me off at home after work one night.  When he stopped in front of my parents’ house, he said “oh wow, you’re one of these rich bastards, huh?” He was busting my chops, as he often did, so I just laughed it off.  I hated falling into this “richie boy” category.  I absolutely hated it.  Okay, I may have said “no, not really” to the girl at the bonfire when she called me a rich kid, but the truth was although not extremely wealthy, my family was pretty well off and my sister and I had the privilege of being raised in a stable, middle-upper class environment.  I hated being called a rich kid because I wasn’t the typical Oakland County kid who looked down on others.  I wasn’t like the other kids at school who ridiculed students who were not as fortunate as my sister and I.  I can say confidently that I never, not once in my life, viewed or treated anyone differently because of their social-economic class.  That’s not how my parents raised me.  I was brought up with the mentality that no matter how different people are than you, you should always be kind and treat them with respect.  You don’t know what they’re going through.  One time I was at a gathering a family friend’s house and I met this kid around my age with scars on his wrist.  I had never seen anything like that and, frankly, I was a little terrified.  Why had this kid done this to himself?  What led him to that point?  I had to get into this guy’s head and find out.  We talked and got to know each other, and he was actually a really cool guy.  We bonded over our shared interest in music and the Red Wings.  I didn’t have the guts to ask him about the scars on his wrist though.  These experiences as a kid really opened my eyes, and I realized how naive I had been growing up in Beverly Hills.  I felt as if the more I got to know people, especially people who were of different races and grew up differently than I did, the more I was learning about the world around me and the more open minded I was becoming. 

My point here is that growing up in an environment like Metro Detroit had bred into me a lifelong interest in other people’s backgrounds, stories, where they came from, what led them to where they are today, etc.  Running ultramarathons presents a great opportunity to get to know others because let’s face it, you’re on the trail for hours on end and what else is there to do besides talk and run, or just keep to yourself.  Ultramarathon running will probably never be a mainstream sport, and personally, I like that.  It has however, attracted a larger following in recent years and I hope it continues to do so.  During an ultramarathon we all share a goal of reaching the finish line and we all love to run, but under the surface, we’re all very different people with very different backgrounds.  That being said, I will continue to read as may books by ultramarathon runners as I can, and I hope that the sport keeps attracting a diverse group of people, so we can all keep telling our unique stories for everyone to hear and enjoy.