On competition: Think it through

Published 12:41 am Thursday, August 12, 2010

A lot of people are competitive by nature. For them it doesn’t matter if the prize is a million bucks or jut a very polished ego. They want to top the next guy in whatever the contest might be — from running a marathon in Chicago to getting in the checkout lane ahead of the other guy. It’s the same adrenaline that pumps that desire, and it may have all started with two Neanderthal men and one piece of pterodactyl left on the spit.

I think there’s some competitive juices inherent in all of us. As a kid, there was often a race to the high-back rocking chair following supper.

Sometimes competition involves neighbors. Generically it’s called “keeping up with the Jones.” That one has never appealed to me. I rationalized that by the time I caught up with the Joneses, they probably would have moved.

Now contests run the gamut and sometimes they can be carried way too far.

And so in Helsinki, a Russian fellow died in the finals of the world sauna championships. Now we know the world is getting bored when someone can invent a contest where people see how long they can sit in a sauna.

According to news reports, Vladimir Lazyzhenskiy died after six minutes in this oven at 230 degrees farenheit. Police said they are investigating the cause of death.

Well, I’m not a Crime Scene Investigator, but I’m going to venture here that the Russian’s heart stopped because he was sitting in an oven at 230 degrees. Water boils at 212 degrees. Go figure.

Now again, let me clarify. I graduated from a state university, not an Ivy League college. But as was pointed out in the movie “Good Will Hunting,” there’s enough valuable information available for free at the public library that would tell me the difference between cooking stew and becoming the stew. And besides, I grew up hanging tobacco in flue curing barns where you could feel the sweat squishing in your shoes. So I would never intentionally try to win a trophy disguised as casserole.

Remember that comment by comedian Ron White? You can’t fix stupid. Almost daily his conclusion is validated.

The other day I drove by a church and on a sign out front was this message: “Jesus is your best friend. If you want to meet him right away, text while driving.”

Yep, it’s stupid to text and drive.

Now back to competitions: Please don’t read into this that we should not be competitive. It can be fun, it can be productive, it can be motivating, etc. But it can also be safe even while being silly. I don’t think anyone’s ever been hurt in a hotdog eating contest.

And sometimes a contest can be very functional. I recall my friend Mickey and I seeing who could hold his breath the longest during a preaching service. Sometimes we would wait until they started singing “Just As I Am.” By the time we were 16 or 17 years old, we could probably have qualified as Navy rescue divers. These little contests helped us stay awake. We had earlier discovered that trying to count the little holes in the Celetex ceiling had a hypnotic effect and would zonk us right out.

Just a parting thought here. If you are going to sign up for a competition, think it through. If you win but you are dead, you don’t get to appear on The Tonight Show or David Letterman with your trophy. I shouldn’t have to explain that part, but the facts are what they are.

(Dwain Walden is editor/publisher of The Moultrie Observer, 985-4545. Email: dwain.walden@gaflnews.com)