Jim Whiting
I can still remember the excitement when I saw my first byline. Several years earlier, I'd suffered through a singularly unpleasant bike trip in France (part of which involved a near-lynch mob, but that's another story). I transmuted it into a cautionary tale that Bike World bought for $15. The amount was trifling. Being paid was terrific. I was now a professional writer.
Growing up in Tacoma,Washington, I was a voracious reader. Adventure, sports, history, biography, mystery-it seemed like I always had my nose in a book. But I never had the same zeal for writing. In fact, putting my thoughts on paper was an onerous, enormous chore. Then I had a stroke of extraordinary luck when I was a senior at Stadium High School. To fill a sudden vacancy in the English department, the school lured Miss Elizabeth Fraser out of retirement. She praised my writing, and convinced me that I had some ability in stringing words and sentences together. At Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington (the valley they liked so much they named it twice), I was fortunate to meet two men who greatly influenced me. One was Dr. George Ball, religion professor and the most compassionate, caring man I've ever met. Hundreds of Whitties will tell you the same thing. The other was Bill Martin, a one-time "world's fastest human," who nurtured my modest talent in running and turned it into a lifelong passion.
Then my life came full circle as I began writing and editing the same type of books that had exerted such a strong fascination when I was growing up. I've also ventured into a number of classrooms, conveying the enthusiasm for writing and for a good story that still animates me. Sometimes I look at my listings in the card catalogue in our local library. It's fun to see how many of my books are off the shelves and in the hands of youngsters who, like me, are transported by the miracle of words on a printed page. |
The twin streams of writing and running came together some years later when I began a 17-year stint publishing Northwest Runner, a regional running magazine. The most frequent comment I heard during those years was, "You must run a lot of marathons." Actually, I hadn't run a lot of marathons. I hadn't run any. When it was time to move on after producing 200 issues, I celebrated by running my one and only lifetime marathon. It was over the original course from the Plain of Marathon to downtown Athens. It also provided an excellent excuse for yet another trip to Greece, which has always exerted a powerful hold on my imagination both intellectually and physically.