Memories I Hope I Never Forget
A few years ago, I had the chance to go to Ireland for work. It was a quick trip, barely five days including travel times. It was in the middle of the most chaotic five work weeks I think I’ve ever had in my adult life. In the middle of a jam-packed summer. But, it was well worth the jet lag and lack of sleep. Those are days filled with memories I hope I never forget.
The trip was a working trip, but also a reward for a job well done. A few unforgettable days in Ireland was the grand prize for a contest my company hosted. The trip involved running a relay race from one side of the country to the other, with a few tourist stops along the way. Around 70 people in all won the trip, from six different countries. Myself and a few lucky others earned the opportunity to be team captains.
I was team captain for one of the five teams from the United States. Two of the people on my team I had gotten to tell in person that they were going to Ireland. [Side note: It’s a great day at work when you get to surprise three people with a box of Lucky Charms and a Guinness to tell them they won a trip to Ireland. It’s an even better day when you find out you’re going too.]
About a month before the trip, I got an email letting me know who was on my team. The whole trip was designed to be an incredible experience. But it was also a race. Three of us were from Ohio, and the rest of my team came from spread out places all over the country. Colorado, Arizona, a guy from Texas. And then there was Karl. A man in his sixties from Philadelphia.
My company tried to make the US teams as even as possible so there would be a good race and some [hopefully] friendly competition. Each team had a fastest person and a slowest person, and a handful of people somewhere in the middle. And from the beginning, before I ever met him or got an email in return, I felt protective of Karl.
When I got my stat sheet for my team, I had a guy who could crush five-minute miles like a metronome. I also had a guy that could run for hours at six-minute pace, and four of us that would be able to hold our own clocking off sub-eights. And I had Karl. A competitive walker who’s knees had long ago forced him to give up running.
My goal from the day I found out I’d be going on the trip was to make sure my team had the most fun I could possibly provide them. I wanted us to cheer every single teammate on with genuine excitement. I wanted us to have positive attitudes and strong camaraderie. But most important of all, I didn’t want anyone to feel for even a moment that they were a weak link.
That’s why I was protective of Karl before I ever met him. I saw numbers on a spreadsheet and a few brief notes about my six teammates. I saw a few very fast times and didn’t know how competitive the individuals on my team would want to be during the relay race. So I made the decision that no matter what, our team wouldn’t get the chance to have a weak link.
At the pre-race dinner, I found out that Karl was probably the most competitive person on our team. He was worried that his pace would let us down, and I was overwhelmingly proud of my team for pushing back on his concerns. Everyone had bought in to my race strategy long before their planes touched down in Ireland. Yes, we’d run hard. But fun and team came first.
We had a great time that night coming up with our race strategy. Everyone would take on their two legs of the relay, and everyone got to contribute to the success of our day. Karl insisted on taking on shorter legs so he could do what was best for the team, and I insisted only that he get flatter terrain because he said it was better for his knees.
Day one was an absolute blast. People who were strangers twelve hours earlier were the best team I could have ever hoped to captain. And that night at dinner when we created our plan for day two, I proved to be more stubborn than Karl. Barely a half mile separated the two shortest legs for the day. One was flat, gorgeous scenery along the west coast of Ireland. The other was shorter and filled with unglamorous view in the final trek to the finish line.
Karl thought he should take the shortest leg so he could do what’s best for the team. I insisted that the best thing for the team would be for him to run the slightly longer, more beautiful leg on the coast. He had stared at that particular section of the map with such awe that I refused to budge. And the rest of the team turned just as stubborn, making Karl take the leg we all knew he wanted.
All of the next morning, any time I sighed and and commented on the scenery, Karl would quip that he didn’t care about the scenery and he just wanted to do what was best for the team. I was pretty sure he was joking, but there were moments I doubted myself. Until he got back in the van after finishing his leg that day. When I said to him that the views must have been just stunning, he smiled and said they really were.
Forcing Karl to take on the leg he wouldn’t admit he wanted to run was my second proudest moment of the entire trip. The first was a couple hours later, on the bus ride to the hotel after the relay ended. After sitting up front with our bus driver for a bit, I turned around to face my team. I saw six teammates clustered together, genuinely friends after only two days together. I knew right then that I had accomplished my goal exactly how I wanted to.
A few weeks after the trip, maybe before I even shared official photos with my team, I received a phone call. Karl had died suddenly and unexpectedly that morning. It was news that hit me hard, and was something I dreaded sharing with my team. Then I printed some photos of him from the trip and put them in a card from our team. I thanked Karl’s family for letting us borrow him for those few days in Ireland. I wrote about how grateful we were to have met him.
That weekend, everyone from our relay team laced up their shoes from Ireland and ran a few miles in Karl’s honor. My heart was heavy, but it felt good to dedicate even something tiny to him. The phone call about Karl was the second in less than two weeks I’d received about a life ending. That run was my second run in two weeks where my heart ached more than my legs. Both deaths had knocked the wind out of me. Both still knock the wind out of me sometimes.
I think about Karl often. The competitive walker with bad knees and a huge heart who never needed my protection. My teammate during a once in a lifetime, unforgettable experience. Karl constantly reminds me that we don’t have a say in how long we get to be here. But we do have a say in the world we create for each other. And I hope I created even half as much brightness in his world as he created in mine. In less than 36 hours of knowing each other.
