Steve Bertrand is never bored.

He has too many things to do to keep him occupied.

There are poems to write, classes to teach, classes to take, books to read, runners to coach, races to run, battles to re-enact, waters to protect, speeches to make, seeds to plant and miles to go before he sleeps.

A friend and former coaching colleague, Tom Campbell, put it best when he said of Bertrand, “He’s the quintessential Renaissance Man.”

It’s pretty obvious Auntie Mame wasn’t talking about Bertrand when she chirped: “Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death.”

Steve Bertrand is eating mighty well. His plate, you might say, is overflowing.

On a bitingly windy, overcast afternoon recently, he was coaching his Cascade High School distance runners in a track meet at Kamiak High School. In the fall, he had coached these same kids — boys and girls — in cross country.

And each day after school, fall and spring, the 53-year-old Bertrand accompanies his kids on a long run. “That’s one of the great things about this sport, I can get out there and mix it up with them,” he said. “That keeps you young, it really does.”

That and his outlook on life. “As an educator and a coach, there are so many good things to get out there and do,” he mused. “Why seek out negatives when you can learn a whole lot about the world and yourself.”

Bertrand was born with itchy feet and a curious mind and he has put both to good use. With three of his six college degrees in literature, creative writing and education, he teaches high school English and has written and published six volumes of poetry.

He also has completed 12 more manuscripts with 50 poems in each and an additional 395 pages containing nearly 2,000 poems. A day doesn’t go by that he doesn’t write some verse. “Poetry,” he said, “comes easy for me.”

Two other things he does each day: He reads and he runs. “Being creative is an important part of my life.”

Not only does he create, but as a history buff, he takes part in re-enactments of Civil War battles, donning his wool Union uniform and arming himself with his European style musket and joining his 7th Wisconsin outfit to skirmish the Confederates. “Typically, we’ll re-enact actual battles,” he said, “or we’ll freelance, kind of make it up … and go with the flow.”

For the past 25 years, Bertrand has been leading tour groups to the East Coast to visit historical sites, including many Civil War battlefields. He does his reconnaissance the hard way, covering the battlegrounds in his running shoes.

On one such run, he stopped to take pictures of a cannon and to imagine what went on there in the 1860s. Suddenly, eerie sounds from a nearby wooded area interrupted his reverie. “It was the moan of like a company of soldiers,” he recalled. “It spooked me more than anything’s ever spooked me in years.”

It was then that he spotted the “spooks.” Emerging from the woods were tourist-toting mules, and it was the braying of these animals that had startled him. “I’d read enough about the ghosts of Civil War battlefields that it had me thinking twice,” he said.

Two summers ago, Bertrand and his wife, Donna Marie, took part in a replay of the battle of Gettysburg, where, 140-some years before, two relatives on his mother’s side died fighting for the Confederacy.

And what role did Bertrand play, a general or a private? “I love being in the trenches,” he said. “Same way with teaching. You’re close to the action.”

Like their coach, Bertrand encourages his students to “get out and spread our wings,” said Cascade distance runner Brayden Shumski. “He wants us to get out and do a bunch of different things.”

Bertrand believes it’s important for him to help develop “well-rounded individuals.”

“This issue of sports specificity versus the Renaissance athlete … I’m in the camp with the Renaissance athlete,” said Bertrand. “I believe that it can help you avoid burnout.”

Case in point: Steve Bertrand.

His interests are so many and so varied that you wonder how he finds time for them all. After 9/11, he felt that he wanted to give back to the community, so he joined the Coast Guard auxiliary. “At an age way beyond what they would ever take someone in the military,” he said with a laugh. “I’ve worked bridge inspections, checked ferry landings, and have just been an extra pair of eyes out there on the water for things that might threaten our coast.”

Of course, to do all this he has to keep his mind and body in fine fettle, thus the 30-50 miles a week he puts in on the roads (he is training for a marathon in June), plus the martial arts in which he got involved with his son, D.J., at the Junjyae Moosul Academy in Mukilteo.

From this has sprung a course he developed and teaches at Cascade: Flexibility and Fitness through Martial Arts. “The whole idea,” he said, “is to develop mind, body and spirit.”

As if all this were not enough to keep him busy, Bertrand has a keen interest in Native American culture in the Northwest and he also does public speaking on subjects related to coaching and running. And somehow he finds time to work in his yard “where I’m happiest.”

He is the well-rounded individual.

He is the Renaissance Man.