Through the Nineties, I developed the theory that long distance running is comparable to life in that both are roughly 95% boredom and pain, punctuated by moments of transcendence. By the end of the Nineties I had refined this theory with the following postulates:
- The more moments of transcendence one accumulates, the less agonizing is the pain, the less dull the boredom, if only for the knowledge that neither the transcendence nor the boredom or the pain lasts forever.
- The more one runs (or lives) the more the transcendence fuses with the boredom and pain, so that repetitive acts—the endless, monotonous progression of one foot in front of the other—become transcendent acts in themselves.
Just added to The List and the Story: Out of the Nineties