His Mind Is Always Racing Far Beyond Founding Bloomsday, Don Kardong Is An Innovator
Don Kardong Age: 49 Occupation: writer
Was the founding of Bloomsday the most creative act ever committed in Spokane? Margo Long, a Whitworth College expert on the subject of creativity, says she thinks so.
After all, it took plenty of imagination to stare at the streets of downtown Spokane in 1977 and say, “You know what? I can envision 50,000 people out here in shorts, plodding 7.46 miles.”
But Don Kardong, 49, the man who dreamed up Bloomsday, denies ever envisioning such a thing.
“At the time, I thought 500 people would have been just huge,” he said with a laugh.
Kardong is innovative in ways that go far beyond envisioning mass stampedes up Doomsday Hill. For more than 10 years, he has made his living as a writer.
He is a senior writer for Runner’s World magazine and the author of three books about running. Sports Illustrated once called him “the only spiritual descendant of Mark Twain ever to bring his unsparing eye and antic voice to running.”
He produces profiles, essays and opinion pieces. He also crafts first-person stories about his truly crazy running exploits, such as the time he ran from one rim of the Grand Canyon to the other and then back again. All in one day. Total elevation change: 20,000 feet.
“That was the hardest run I’ve ever done,” he said. “On the final 10 kilometers from the Colorado River to the top, I wasn’t running anymore. I was just walking as fast as I could.”
Then there was the time he wrote about a “Pasta Safari,” a quest to follow the runner’s favorite food on its journey from wheatfield to grain elevator to factory to kitchen.
“I thought that story was really funny,” said Kardong. “If I had known you could make a career writing about food, I would have taken that path.”
So how does he come up with these ideas?
He runs, that’s how. He is convinced there is a strong connection between running and creativity.
“I know, from both my own experience and from talking to other runners, that the most creative time they ever have is while they’re running,” said Kardong. “Some of it is, you don’t have the distractions of your business or your job. You can both concentrate and free-associate. You have a lot of different stimuli around you and your thoughts are flowing freely. And you’re probably getting a lot of oxygen to the brain.”
The result: the best block of pure thinking time you’re likely to have all day. Kardong said that runners describe their thoughts while running as either intuitive, creative or problem-solving, “all of which are probably the same thing anyway.”
Whatever you call it, it works for him.
“If I am writing a story and I run into a wall about how I’m going to express something, if I go out on a run I almost always figure it out,” he said. “In other things, too - my personal life, things at work, all of these things get sorted out.”
However, there is one little problem. A runner can’t exactly stop every block and jot down notes. If Kardong thinks of a particularly good line while running, he’ll repeat it over and over again to himself so he won’t forget it. He also has developed a memory technique in which he creates an image for the idea and “deposits” it at a certain spot for later retrieval. His imaginary cache spots are, naturally, on the Bloomsday course even if he is actually running somewhere else.
“Let’s say I’m going to work-in a reference to marshmallows in a story,” he said. “In my mind, I’ll go through the Bloomsday course and, at mile one, there’ll be an enormous marshmallow man. You create the image and when you get back from your run, you say, ‘I had some ideas, what were they?’ and it’s very easy to call up the ideas you created. I can usually get through about four miles, but by the fifth mile I can’t remember what it was.”
And if that sounds too complicated, here’s an easier way: Carry a miniature tape recorder and talk into it.
“I’ve done that before,” said Kardong. “It’s just a little… weird.”
Running and creativity are even more tightly connected for Kardong than for most people, because it was running that got him into writing. His first writing job was back in 1975, when he was invited to write a first-person piece for Runner’s World about a track-and-field tour of China. When that story was a success, he was invited to do a monthly journal for Running Times about training for the 1980 Olympics.
He continued to write part-time. Then, around 1986, he became a full-time writer for Runner’s World. Almost all of his writing is about running, because he said “it’s the only thing I know anything about.”
That’s clear from his fourth-place finish in the 1976 Olympic marathon. Sometimes, however, being a world-class runner is a detriment to his writing. One of his favorite stories was about Le Grizz, a 50-mile race through the wilds of Montana. His only regret: He won the race.
“In a way, it’s better for a piece of writing if you have a disastrous experience,” said Kardong. “When you have a tough time, people can relate to that.”
Kardong’s books are “Bloomsday: A City In Motion” (1989) and two collections of magazine pieces titled, “Thirty Phone Booths From Boston” (1985) and “Hills, Hawgs & Ho Chi Minh” (1996). He has a novel inside of him, but so far the novel has stayed inside of him.
“I get lots of good ideas during runs for that book,” he said. “I just never write them down.”
In any case, Kardong’s example should prove heartening to all runners who are training for Bloomsday this year. Use all of that extra oxygen in your head to think some creative thoughts.
And, for goodness sake, bring a tape recorder.
WE’RE STILL LOOKING Do you know someone who should be part of our Creative ‘98 project? Someone who is passionate, inspiring and energetic? It’s easy to tell us about those people. Send us the names, how we can reach them, their ages and why you think they are creative. Please include your name, too. You can write: Creative ‘98, The Spokesman-Review Newsroom, P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210. Fax: (509) 459-5482 in Spokane; or (208) 765-7149 in Idaho. Call CityLine: (509) 458-8800 or (208) 765-8811. The category is 9882. Or you can e-mail: shellyd@spokesman.com