In Honor of Today's Boston Marathon | Running Headlong Toward Tomorrow's Promise | Exploring Life Beyond the Next Scotch and Sofa

On this brisk morning of the Boston Marathon, as thousands of hopefuls line up, pulsing with the collective ambition of conquering Heartbreak Hill, it's the perfect time to remember the spirit of Ellison “Tarzan” Brown, the legendary Westerly, Rhode Island runner who famously gave the notorious hill its name. Brown, a member of the Narragansett tribe, not only won the Boston Marathon in 1936 and 1939 but also embodied a story of perseverance and resilience that resonates deeply in today's dire need for optimistic endurance. As runners today channel their strength and determination, Brown’s legacy serves as a powerful reminder of the enduring human spirit, capable of overcoming the steepest of challenges to realize inner potential.

Imagine, if you will, a runner’s muscular shadow stretching across the cracked pavement of the Boston Marathon, slicing through the April chill. This shadow belongs to Ellison “Tarzan” Brown, a man whose very stride seems to scoff at the notion of inertia. Why, you might ask, do some choose to run, not from something, but towards something? And what, exactly, is Brown running towards?

Brown’s triumph in 1936 and 1939 was not just a victory of one or two races but a metaphorical marathon of endurance against adversity. Now, picture this: what if Brown had chosen to sit? To rest on a bench and watch the runners zip by? I imagine he'd feel the whoosh of their energy, the collective rush of dreams charging towards the finish line, and oh, how that would itch—a maddening tickle on the soles of his feet, urging him to leap up and join the fray.

But no, sitting is for spectators, and Brown was anything but. With every pounding of his sometimes bare feet against the stubborn asphalt, wasn’t he hammering out the questions we all ask in the dim, quiet of our less public moments? How fast can I go? How far? Can the child born into an indigenous tribe who was told to slow down, to not dream quite so big, outrun his doubters?

Indeed, with his Narragansett heritage pulsing like a steadfast drum, Brown wasn't just running races. He was challenging the very ground taken from his people and he ran on to take it back in the only way he could. What does it take, do you think, to look back at a history of cultural sidelining and say, ‘No, you move’?

As he surged ahead, each mile conquered in the Boston Marathon must have felt like a small act of defiance—a way of pulling the past along, not as a weight but as a witness to the transformation of trauma into triumph. How often do we tie our potential to the cumbersome wagon of our previous failures or the expectations others set for us?

In Brown’s relentless forward motion, we see the poetry of action. It’s not the manic spinning of wheels that go nowhere but the surge of muscles, the heartbeat loud in one’s ears, the deep lungfuls of brisk air, and the singular focus on the ribbon of road unwinding ahead. What if we all ran like Brown, not on a literal track but in our endeavors? What if we treated each day as a leg of a marathon, not to be won in a sprint, but to be steadily conquered with persistence and grace?

As Ellison "Tarzan" Brown crossed the finish line, the laurel wreath placed upon his brow must have whispered of old victories and indigenous pride, but also of the promise that lies in the stretch of road ahead. It invites us to ponder—what if we chose to run, not because we are chased by the ghosts of yesteryears but because we are eager to meet the horizons of tomorrow?

Would you, like Brown, take to the starting line with the audacity to outrun the very shadows of history? Would you dare to see each challenge not as a barrier but as an invitation to redefine the limits of your own endurance?

In a world brimming with soft chairs, sofas, and scotch, be an Ellison "Tarzan" Brown. Run, because the action of your feet, the pumping of your blood, and the fire of your breath are affirmations of life’s most persistent question: What if? And in that relentless pursuit, perhaps what you are running towards is not a finish line but a continuous revelation of your own untapped potentials.

Post Script

I was lucky enough to hear one of the greatest calls to fulfill one's promise ever.

After the disappointing freshman college cross-country season, we were called to a sleepy end-of-season Awards Banquet. What was there really to celebrate? The different alumni speakers droned on about the youthful potential of this highly touted recruiting class and promising horizons, and then our captain Steve Kelts stood up, cleared his throat, and declared, "Potential sucks!" It woke the room up.

Our captain’s abrupt detour from the evening's script—a marathon of back-patting about next year's team—was like throwing a toaster into a bathtub: shocking, but undeniably electrifying. He proposed a wild idea: what if, instead of patting ourselves on the back for what could be, we laces up our shoes and ran headlong into the messy, sweaty business of making it happen? What if potential wasn't just a shiny trophy to admire from a distance but a call to arms (or is it feet)?

Imagine sitting there, as the word "potential" begins to sound more like a curse than a promise. Could it be that in expecting so much, we allow ourselves to do so little? Our captain seemed to ask each of us: what are you going to do about it? What if the real potential was in doing, not dreaming? Now, wouldn't that be something?