Shirking Duty, Shirking Reality

This weekend, DH and I went to the finish line of the Western States, a 100 mile run. No kidding. It was pretty amazing to see some of those finishers come across the line, completely delirious, unable to tell if it was people cheering them on or cows laughing at them or giraffes dancing a merry jig. This race showed me that if you run 100 miles, you may literally go crazy.

I ended up talking to this guy who had finished the race 11 or 12 times. He entered this year and gave up around mile 20 or 30, but he wasn't bothered. (Unlike the 20-something Swedish guy he kept pointing at--that guy looked pretty depressed. No wonder. Sweden is far, and it's not like the Sacramento Valley tops the Swedish list of must go places. ) Anyway, he started telling me his life story, which is basically that he'd spent his whole life doing extremely strange and inhuman athletic activities, including the 2nd Ironman Triathalon ever. He was totally believable in that sinewy, old hippie kind of way, like the kind of guy who didn't know cycling shorts were or had been wearing the same wool socks since 1981.

He was also 65 years old. Amazing. The guy had lived in Hawaii for years (since the 2nd Ironman Triathalon, actually), and from what I could tell, spent most of that time camping. He told me his big break came at age 60, when he qualified for senior housing, which was very discounted, and he got a roof over his head. He had a friend who had paid for his trip, was staying with another friend. He was quite the nomad, and a little bit of a mooch.

And get this--his name was Shirk. I didn't want to ask him if it was a metaphor, because he shirks real life. I just figured it all fit together in a groovy, cosmic way, and if Shirk was happy, I was happy for him. He was a cool old dude. The world balanced out for him.

Of course, Shirk made me think about infertility. (What doesn't, right?) He made me think about how I'm seriously wanting to do some shirking of my own, with the next cycle coming up. And it's not like I plan to lay on a beach in Hawaii. I plan to be responsible as ever and pay my mortgage and my student loan and work hard. I'd just like to do it without shots and craziness and...failure. I am really sick of failure.

Seems to me, Shirk's got things about right...