"Good Job!"

I do quite a bit of running on the Lake Overstreet Trails in Maclay Gardens State Park, sometimes five or six times a week. During the fall it's infested with high school cross-country runners. That's okay; the trails are wide enough. But they have a common greeting:

"Good job!"

Sometimes they're running hard enough that they don't really have enough breath to say anything at all, but they manage to gasp it out as they go by.

"Good job!"

I've found that it doesn't really matter whether I'm actually doing a "good job" or not. I can be jogging a two-mile warm-up, thinking about surviving a session of repeat miles on the trail, and I'll still get the same evaluation.

"Good job!"

In those circumstances it's almost insulting. Do I really look like I'm going flat out and giving it my best when I'm doing a warm-up shuffle? The years are never kind, but I didn't think that I had reached the point where I couldn't go slow enough to look like I was loafing.

Obviously, they don't actually mean it. "Good job!" seems to be the distance-running equivalent of "Have a nice day!" George Carlin has already dissected "Have a nice day!" Too bad he's no longer around to do the same to "Good job!"

Somehow, though, I didn't get the memo informing me that the standard runner-to-runner greeting on trail was now "Good job!" I'm not the only one, though. No even all the high school runners will "good job" you. It seems to follow team lines. This makes me imagine a scenario where part of the orientation for new runners on certain teams is learning to "good job" other runners.

"Now we train every day, rain or shine. Don't skip practice then come back the next day and say you thought it was canceled because there was a hail storm. This is cross country; we run in all kinds of conditions. If you miss practice then you're letting down the other runners on the team, and cross country is a team sport. Always remember that. I want each of you to support and encourage the other runners on the team. You see one of your teammates running, tell him 'Good job!' In fact, anyone you see running, tell him 'Good job!' This is a tough sport and we've got to encourage one another."

I could see that. That's the kind of thing I remember from team meetings, back when I had to go to team meetings, and before I stopped paying attention during them.

Although I don't "good job" other runners, I confess to using equally mindless greetings on the trail. "Go get it!" "Hang in there!" "Be tough!" "Looking good!" "Way to go!" If there's a cult, I've flunked giving the recognition signal. I don't know the secret handshake, either.

But enough. This is starting to read disturbingly like an Andy Rooney whine. Thanks for hearing me out. Oh, you've made it to the end?

Good job!