Thank you!
Your support is sustaining the future of local news in our communities.

Be stoic about it

Ancient wisdom doesn’t die; it just shows up at your favorite sports venue.

The latest example was offered by a woman named Sydney McLaughlin at the United States Track and Field Trials.

Ms. McLaughlin runs the 400-meter hurdles, a race that may be the most demanding run this side of a marathon. The 400 is once around the track and is somewhere between a sprint and a longer run. Essentially, you have to put the accelerator to the floor and sprint until you think you can go no farther and then see you have a hundred meters to go. Add to that general nastiness the need to jump over ten hurdles, and you have the making for 50 some odd seconds of absolute misery.

So how does one handle it? By going stoic of course.

Stoicism is one of the West’s oldest philosophies, and one of the best known; however, many people mistakenly think that its just a philosophy for tough guys who don’t want to show any emotion under any circumstances. You know, the John Wayne level of emotional IQ, somewhere between zero and non-existent.

Ms. McLaughlin would be pleased to set anyone of such an opinion straight.

When asked what advice she would give to herself, looking back to when she was beginning her career, she replied, “I would tell myself to try to control only those things I have power over and not pay attention to anything else.”

Now it just so happens that rule is number one in the Stoic Handbook. The ancients may have stated it more grandly, and certainly would have in ancient Latin or Greek, but the idea is the same and has been handed down for centuries.

I have heard the same sentiment from everyone from baseball pitchers to champion golfers, and maybe from a few of us not so champion hackers as well.

If you wish to listen to some modern Stoics, just listen to some athletes who have just come through the fire of doing their best under the most trying circumstances; what they have to say would make many an ancient philosopher pop his toga.

 

Millerton resident Theodore Kneeland is a former teacher and coach — and athlete.

Theodore Kneeland

Latest News

The Millerton News - November 12, 2026

The Millerton News - November 12, 2026

Download directly

Original art, attainable prices

Original art, attainable prices

Kenise Barnes Fine Art presents “Cool & Collected ’26,” its annual exhibition celebrating the joy of collecting, featuring works priced under $2,000.

D.H. Callahan

There’s a corner of YouTube populated by real-time footage of high-dollar art sales from prestigious New York and London auction houses like Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Phillips. Hundreds of thousands of viewers routinely watch with rapt attention, popcorn and cocktails in hand, as recognizable pieces from art history make their way to the upper echelons of grossly unattainable hammer prices. Pieces can often start with opening bids of tens of thousands of dollars and work their way up to multiple millions. Bidding increments alone can grow to sums unattainable for the average American family in several lifetimes.

Kenise Barnes Fine Art in Kent, Connecticut, wants to help make fine art more accessible. The 2026 version of the gallery’s annual “Cool and Collected” exhibition is subtitled “The Gift Edit” and features dozens of works by fine artists at prices that are much more in reach than an art-world outsider might expect. More than 30 artists contributed pieces to the show. Almost all available works are priced under $2,000, with many below $500. The collection features paintings, drawings, collage and ceramics.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit

Jennifer Terzian’s sanctuary for contemporary art

Jennifer Terzian’s sanctuary for contemporary art
Jennifer Terzian, founder of Jennifer Terzian Gallery in Litchfield.
Provided
The gallery is really meant to create a very intimate relationship with the artist and the story behind their work.
—Jennifer Terzian

On a recent crisp, fall afternoon in Litchfield, Jennifer Terzian welcomed a steady stream of collectors, artists, and art-world insiders into her jewel box of an art space on South Street, just off the town’s manicured historic Green.

The occasion was an opening for Jenny Kemp, an artist noted for balancing fluidity and structure in her abstractions through repetition, variation, and gradual shifts in hue. Hers is exactly the kind of tactile, process-driven work Terzian champions at a subterranean space that feels less like a commercial art gallery and more like stumbling into an impeccably edited sanctuary of contemporary thought.

Keep ReadingShow less
our community
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

Peter Cusack is finding the eternal in North Canaan

Peter Cusack is finding the eternal in North Canaan
Peter Cusack in his studio.
Provided

“I think art is the thing that allows us to feel there’s something in the universe that loves us,” said painter Peter Cusack in his new studio, a mid-19th-century stone church on Main Street in North Canaan.

For Cusack, art has always been a way of reaching toward something beyond the physical world. That sensibility runs through “Eternal: New, Recent, and Near Distant Paintings,” his upcoming exhibition in the church, a setting that seems an improbably good fit.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years at the Mahaiwe

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years at the Mahaiwe

Cowboy Junkies celebrate 40 years together at the Mahaiwe Nov. 14

Heather Pollock

Now celebrating 40 years, Cowboy Junkies will perform Saturday, Nov. 14, at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington, Massachusetts.

The band is celebrating its long career with a triple-vinyl retrospective album called “Open to Beauty,” featuring a selection of songs from 2000 onward, including material from its most recent release, “Such Ferocious Beauty.”

Keep ReadingShow less
concerts

Mike Selbach finds the extraordinary in everyday life

Mike Selbach finds the extraordinary in everyday life
“R46 Interior” (2026). Solid cherry and acrylic, 21” x 26.75” x 0.75”
Provided

Subway stations may seem unlikely places to encounter the divine, but amid the rumble of trains, the crush of commuters and the cavernous underground passageways, Salisbury artist Mike Selbach finds moments of unexpected beauty.

In “Subway Saints,” his solo exhibition opening Thursday, Nov. 12 at the Warren Family Gallery at Berkshire School in Sheffield, Massachusetts, Selbach transforms ordinary commuters and familiar transit spaces into sacred moments.

Keep ReadingShow less
exhibit
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.