Albert Fox Cahn - With a Little Help from My Nemesis

 

 

Growing up, I wasn't just unathletic, I was anti-athletic. I was the kid in gym class arguing, “No, you are exposing us to a risk of stroke and embolism. [audience laughter] So, no, I will not do those jumping jacks.” You might have noticed I have a penchant for arguing, which is probably how I ended up as a lawyer. Specifically, a civil rights lawyer. Even more specifically, a civil rights lawyer working on behalf of the Muslim community, which only comes into this story to explain that 2017 was a bit hectic. [audience laughter] 

 

And in the aftermath of the Muslim ban and the hate crime surge, as I was pulling all-nighter after all-nighter, the work started to take a toll on my health. Suddenly, the lifestyle issues I had been putting off became a real concern. An increasingly somber set of meetings with increasingly sober specialists told me that I had to drastically change my life immediately. 

 

So, my best friend from college and I did what nerds always do in our times of need, we turned to math. Specifically, a spreadsheet, a collection of rules and formulas with the goal of making sure that we stayed on track. We would check in with each other every week about diet, about exercise. We needed a penalty, a price to pay, if we didn't live up to our end of the bargain. We thought long and hard about what we could do that would actually make us take this seriously. 

 

And so, one afternoon, I finally gave in, and I wrote a check that he would keep in safety, a check to the NRA for $10,000. [audience aww] Every morning when I wanted to hit the snooze button, every morning when I wanted to sleep in, [audience laughter] I would picture Wayne LaPierre, the NRA spokesperson, at the foot of my bed, a Cheshire grin, a gleam in his eyes, just holding up the check and mouthing the words, “Thank you.” [audience laughter] And that was enough to get me going. [audience laughter] 

 

At first, I was just going out to walk for a little bit, and then the walking turned into schlepping, and then schlepping turned into running and just half a mile. And then, one Sunday, I actually ran for five kilometers. For the first time, it felt like this was actually becoming a part of who I was. I wasn't just pretending to do the exercise thing. So, in a moment of irrational exuberance, I signed up for races. [audience chuckle] I signed up for 5k and a half marathon and I instantly regretted that choice. [audience laughter] 

 

As the race drew near, I knew that it was all a terrible mistake. When it was the night before, I couldn't sleep at all. I had these mental images of crawling towards the finish line as these lithe little runners went by, like the Roadrunner just stopping long enough to look at me and go, “Beep, beep” [audience laughter] before speeding beyond. When I got to the race, I was ready for it to all implode after a couple miles. But then, mile after mile, it was working. I was still there. There were actually people slower than me. For the first time in my life, I was ecstatic at the thought of being mediocre. [audience laughter] I was there in the middle of the pack, well, slightly behind the middle.

 

But as we got to mile 11 and I saw the hundreds of people that had gathered at the last big hill, I took out my headphones and I heard the chants and the cheers and saw the nerdy signs. It would have seemed so corny just a couple days before. And now, it seemed like one of the most generous things I had ever seen. It brought me to tears. When I finally got to the end, I mouthed a silent thank you, the first and the last that I'll ever say to Wayne LaPierre. [audience laughter] 

 

Now, the challenge ended after a year, but I'm still running. I even signed up to do the full marathon in November. [audience cheers and applause] 

 

As I've kept going with all the races, I've gotten a collection of all these little medals. I don't know what to do with them. They've just gathered around the apartment. But there is one award that has a place of prominence. It's a little black frame at the foot of my bed with that check that I know will never be cashed. And every time I look at it, it's a reminder to me that so often the things that we think are impossible, we can do if we have the support of our friends, and maybe even an enemy. Thank you.