You run, but you’re not a runner.
That’s what I told a friend who complained how much he hated running.
But he ran anyway.
He was trying to keep in shape, after all.
Which was commendable.
But, predictably, he didn’t stick with it.
It’s hard to do something consistently that you dislike.
That’s why I don’t play golf.
Yes, I’ve occasionally golfed.
But I’m not a golfer.
Not even close.
I have stuck with running for a while, though.
Which I suppose makes me a runner.
That makes sense.
I’m skinny, with a decent set of lungs, so I don’t have to work too hard at it.
And it gets me outside.
I don’t spend nearly enough time outside.
Plus, there’s no better way to get the lay of the land in a new place than to go for a run.
Or to indulge one’s sense of nostalgia than to re-trace one’s steps through meaningful places of the past.
I love doing that.
Take Washington, DC, for example.
I spent a portion of a summer there.
I was all into politics then.
Not anymore.
I’m over that.
Even though every Myers-Briggs-type temperament assessment I’ve ever taken has suggested I’m ideally suited for it.
I have the optimum combination of ego and great hair.
Yes, I might indeed make a good politician.
But don’t look for my name on a ballot any time soon.
I thought differently when I was younger, though.
DC was the place to be, as far as I was concerned.
And so I talked my way into an internship with my Congressman, The Honorable Dave Camp of Michigan’s Fourth District.
He would eventually serve as the Chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee.
“Sorry,” his chief of staff had said, “but we’ve already hired all our paid interns for the summer.”
Who said anything about getting paid? I asked.
I was a Naval Academy midshipman drawing a stipend from the government.
That was all I needed.
“Oh. Okay,” the chief of staff replied.
And that was that.
The Congressman and his staff worked in the Cannon House Office Building, across the street from the Capitol.
I passed it the other morning, having run up New Jersey Avenue from my hotel.
I was in town for some meetings and took the opportunity to revisit some of the more prominent landmarks from that way-back-when summer.
And, of course, I did so on my morning runs.
I always enjoyed walking into the Cannon building, having emerged from the Capitol South Metro stop.
It made me feel all grown-up.
And I’d usually encounter one of Sonny Bono’s staffers on the walk in.
The late variety show host and California Congressman had an office next to Congressman Camp’s.
Members of Bono’s staff were remarkably similar.
They were young.
And female.
And they all looked like they’d just stepped out of a Beach Boy’s album cover.
I didn’t mind that.
And a friendly hello from one of them first thing in the morning was always a day brightener.
Always.
Congressman Camp took an interest in me.
Maybe it was because I was midshipman.
Or that I worked for free.
Whatever the case, he went out of his way to provide me with a good experience.
He taught me his tour route of the Capitol building and then had me give tours to groups of visiting constituents.
That was cool.
He took me to the House chamber and had me sit in the gallery while he made a speech on the floor.
He took me to the Members’ dining room and insisted I have the bean soup.
That was apparently a big thing in Congress.
The soup.
Then, one day, he came to me and said there was someone he’d like me to meet.
A couple days later, I was ushered into Senator Bob Dole’s office.
The Senator reached out his left hand to shake mine, his right hand gripping a pen.
He had been seriously wounded in Italy during World War II and had lost nearly all the function in that hand.
A photographer emerged from out of nowhere and snapped our picture.
“What’s your boss up to?” he asked me.
The Congressman was back in Michigan for a few days, I told him.
“Making money, I hope,” Dole said.
Uhhh . . . yes, sir, I replied.
Fundraising was everything, even then.
A few days later, I received a signed picture of Senator Dole and me.
Which, to this day, remains a favorite keepsake.
My run continued across Independence Avenue to First Street, past the Library of Congress and the Supreme Court.
Then I looped around the Capitol and merged onto the sidewalk that paralleled Constitution Avenue and the Mall.
I continued on the sidewalk, running in the direction of the Washington Monument.
About halfway down the Mall, I came upon the spot where I had joined fellow members of Congressman Camp’s staff for softball games on Tuesday nights.
We played against the members of other Congressional staffs.
I could hold my own, having had a respectable little league career.
But that was hardly the point.
Looking back, the very act of hitting a softball on a makeshift diamond situated between Capitol Hill and the Smithsonian’s various museums seems surreal.
What an extraordinarily unique, American experience.
And I sincerely hope today’s Congressional staffers still play softball on the Mall.
It’s good for them. And us.
As my time in DC that summer was winding down, I got a call from Senator John McCain’s office.
I’d been put in touch with his chief of staff through a mutual connection and was hoping to meet the Senator.
He was a Naval Academy grad, Class of 1958, and a former aviator and prisoner of war in North Vietnam.
I just wanted to shake his hand.
“Come on over,” his chief of staff told me. “I’ll get you in to see the Senator.”
And so I arrived at McCain’s office at the appointed time and took a seat in the waiting area.
There, I met a very nice lady about my grandmother’s age.
We struck up a conversation.
“Why are you here to see the Senator?” she asked me.
I explained that I was a student at the Naval Academy, interning on Capitol Hill, and just really wanted to meet him.
“Is that right?” she replied. “My son went to the Naval Academy!”
And we chatted for a while longer before McCain’s chief of staff came to escort me in to meet the Senator.
Such a nice lady, I thought.
When I walked into the Senator’s office, the first thing I noticed was the flight helmet on the shelf behind his desk.
He’d been an A-4 Skyhawk pilot and was shot down over Norther Vietnam during Operation Rolling Thunder in October 1967.
I was hesitant to ask him about his POW experience, concerned it might be impolite to do so.
So, instead, I asked him about politics and life as a Senator.
He brushed that aside.
“Forget about all that,” he said. “You need to focus on being a warfighter first.”
And then we talked about his flying days and life at the Academy.
The Senator had made his point.
And I appreciated that.
After about fifteen minutes, the chief of staff came into the office to usher me out.
Again, a photographer appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, and snapped a picture of Senator McCain and me.
A signed copy of that photo still hangs on my wall today.
When the chief of staff and I got to the Senator’s outer office, I noticed the lady with whom I’d been speaking was gone.
“Mrs. McCain told me to take care of you while you were in town,” the chief of staff said. “You apparently made quite an impression on her.”
Mrs. McCain?
When had I ever met the Senator’s wife?
Then I figured it out.
“Mrs. McCain” was Roberta McCain, the Senator’s mother.
She was the wife of the late Admiral John S. McCain, Jr.
And daughter-in-law to Admiral “Slew” McCain of World War II fame.
She was the nice lady with whom I’d been speaking before meeting the Senator.
I had no idea.
About a week later, McCain’s chief of staff called me.
“Do you like tennis?” he asked me.
The Senator had tickets to a match and wondered if I might like them.
Of course! I said.
And that Friday night, I sat courtside while Andre Agassi, then in his prime, totally destroyed some guy.
It was incredible.
I had no idea the pros hit the ball that hard.
Thank you, Mrs. McCain!
Yeah, that was a hell of a summer.
And it all came back to me as I completed my lap around the Mall and Capitol Hill.
Camp. Dole. McCain.
Maybe if Congress were populated entirely with such people, I’d reconsider politics.
Maybe.
In the meantime,
I’ll just keep running.
Because while I may not be a politician,
Or a golfer,
I do consider myself
One hell
Of a runner.