Overachievers

Dan Needham was the step father of Owen Meany in A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving. I am thoroughly enjoying the read. He was a teacher at Gravesend Academy and a resident assistant on the third floor of Waterhouse Hall.  In reference to the fourth floor resident assistant—Mr. Tubulari, the track and field coach who had left campus for the holidays, Dan said:

“Mr. Tubulari was off competing in some grueling athletic event over Christmas—actually a pentathlon of the harshest-possible wintertime activities; a “winterthon,”, Mr. Tubulari had called it.  Dan Needham hated made-up words, and he became quite boisterous on the subject of what wintertime events Mr. Tubulari was competing in; the fanatic had gone to Alaska, or maybe Minnesota. (They were in New Hampshire) 

Dan would entertain Owen and me by describing Mr. Tublari’s pentathlon, his ‘winterthon’. 

“The first event,” Dan said, “is something wholesome, like splitting a cord of wood—points off if you break your ax.  Then, you have to run ten miles in deep snow, or snowshoe for thirty.  Then you chop a hole in the ice, and —carrying your ax—swim a mile under a frozen lake, chopping your way out of the opposite shore.  

Then you build an igloo—to get warm.  Then comes the dogsledding.  You have to mush a team of dogs—from Anchorage to Chicago.  Then you build another igloo—to rest.”

“THAT’S SIX EVENTS”, Owen said, “A PENTATHLON IS ONLY FIVE.”  “So forget the second igloo,” Dan Needham said. 

We all know someone like Tubulari.   It’s ok to just do TWO events. 

Pg. 157, A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (the basis for the movie, Simon Birch)