Erin Dush, No. 6

Erin is lowered to the ground by her track coach, right, and Eric O'Dell upon collapsing at the finish line after running the two mile at the league track meet in May. Erin, who suffers from vasovagal syncope, picked up where she left off in high school by pushing herself to the limit this past fall and passing out during or after several cross country races for SVSU. Along the way she achieved a personal record in almost every race, besting her senior year time in the 5k by over a minute. "...we've always said that cross country—it's totally different than other sports because you could just beat someone, or both of you are just dying at the end ... but you never see bad sportsmanship at cross country, I don't think .... Someone will be puking and someone else will be falling over but they'll both help pick each other up and walk off. Or as you're running you'll be dying but the person next to you is like, "Good job, keep going," and they have no clue who you are."

Thanks for the inspiration, Erin.

blogs

David Carr had an insightful, witty, and all-around enjoyable column on blogs in yesterday's NY Times

"Chop your own wood, and it will warm you twice."

A Henry Ford quote, folks. Brett lies on the ground next to the fire, soaking up the energy from the earth per the advice of Vasilisa Bardina's father, who had his daughter and Russian tennis player stand barefoot in the snow during the Dow Corning Tennis Classic last winter. Ryan surveys the land in the background as we take a break from rooting out and destroying diseased trees yesterday.