Voices

Yesterday I ran the 4 mile loop around the lake near LSU, starting and finishing at the Baton Rouge Beach. Now this is a beach in name only which is a shame considering the lake boarders campus. However, if I was in charge of LSU I would turn all of sorority row into general student housing, tear up the road running in front of the sorority houses, and turn that entire area into a sandy beach for general student use. Of course if anyone tried this they would be probably be assassinated by a sniper team composed of angry Tri-Delts, DZ’s, Chi-O’s, and Kappa Kappa Gammas. If I learned anything from my student government days at LSU it was not to F… with the sororities. Anyway, I had an average run though way slower than I planned for 2 reasons. First, a little more than 2 miles into the run I ran into an old friend from college I had not seen in years walking the other way. She was actually an old girlfriend of one of my good friends. We chatted for about 5 minutes then headed our separate ways. Second, about a mile later I spent almost 3 minutes stretching and trying to pound out a massive cramp in my left quadriceps.

Anyhow I finished, stretched a little more, then headed back to my car when I heard this voice from a distance, an unmistakable voice I hadn’t heard in years but I recognized it right away.

Digressing for a second, it’s amazing to me how a human being can identify another individual human being just by the sound of their voice. Of course family and close friends are easy to identify most of the time, as well as those with distinctive voices. I imagine if I was walking down the street and heard Barry White singing behind me I would recognize his voice almost immediately. Of course if it was actually Barry White I would then take off running the other way (or maybe join in if he was singing My First, My Last, My Everything, that’s an all-time jam). And I have a few professors whose voices I could probably identify too.

Anyway this voice I heard belonged to one of my old high school track coaches. He works at another school now and had some of his runners out at the beach for practice. I went and spoke for a few minutes, exchanged normal pleasantries, etc. I’ll always remember his voice as well as the voices of my other two other coaches from high school, the most palpable explanation being when someone yells at you for an hour each day its hard to forgot their voices. Coach had aged and looked different, but even if he underwent a Michael Jackson level physical transformation I would always be able to recognize that voice.