Why I Run

"Ten years ago, when I turned 40, my father posted a birthday message on my Facebook page that was visible to all of my friends and followers. I had a great life, he said: a loving wife, three beautiful children, a successful career. But all men's lives fall apart at this age, he warned. He was 73 then, and was thinking of his own life and of his father's."

"I read the post, puzzled. It was a private note in a very public place. I responded with humor and deflection, but it made me realize something. My father's old friends always said that I remind them of him. I had spent much of my life trying to be like him: going to the same schools, traveling to the same places, taking up the same hobbies, forever seeking his approval. But I also desperately wanted not to be like him."

"Running seemed like it might be the key. Running had helped him hold things together until middle age. Then he had stopped. I had run with him for years, and I was still competing in marathons. I was going to keep on running, and I was going to keep doing it well. People often told me that my father was unlike anyone they'd ever known."

A father's public Facebook warning at his son's 40th birthday prompts the son to confront familial patterns and dread of a midlife collapse. The father rose from a difficult childhood to major academic success but later struggled with drinking and lost stability. The son describes years of trying to emulate his father while fearing the same unraveling, and he uses running as a discipline and protective routine. Running provided structure through shared activity and ongoing competition, forming a deliberate strategy to maintain control and avoid the spiral that consumed his father.

Read at The Atlantic