Short, sweet reminder of what it takes to call yourself a writer by a friend of mine:
Corbie-Crow: The Writer Needs to Swim Upstream: I was reading some of Wallace Stegner's thoughts on writing this morning and came across this: "...talent is very common. It's...
Mai Too Sense
Better a smartass than a dumbass...
Monday, September 16, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
When Looking Back Is Better
Hunched over my handlebars, eyes fixed on the road inches in
front of my tire, mouth hanging open to capture as much of the arid air as I
could with each heaving gasp, I watched the asphalt crawl by. I was making slow progress three minutes ago
when the older biker passed me. I was
making slower progress now.
A shadow passed over the road ahead, so I glanced up into
the punishing sun. A single raven
circled and came to rest atop a boulder near a road sign beside the bike lane about
30 yards ahead, and watched me approach.
He was a big one. At least two
feet from tip to tail. I had talked
myself past the last few logical stopping points, so this looked as good a
place to stop as any.
When you climb a hill on a bike, it’s a battle between your
legs and gravity. Wheels roll backward
as easily as they do forward. You stop
peddling, you stop making forward progress.
Gravity wins.
I pulled to a stop beside the sign and the raven hopped down
for a closer look at me, head cocked slightly to the side. With one hand, I reached back to retrieve a
hand towel from a rear shirt pocket and with the other pulled my sunglasses
off. The light was painfully bright, but
after I wiped away the rivulets of sweaty sunscreen stinging my eyes, I squinted
one open and scanned around to make sure the well-fed scavenger was alone. He probably wanted a hand out. But I didn’t like to think that he sensed
something I didn’t and wanted to beat the lunch rush.
Photo by HotBlack at MorgueFile.com |
I looked ahead, evaluating the age and fitness of the older biker
who was continuing to pull away seemingly without effort. That could be me in 20 years if I kept at
this. It occurred to me more as a
question than a statement of confidence.
Could that be me? Ever?
The road up to NCAR (The National Center for Atmospheric
Research) is a little over 1 mile from its entrance up to the laboratory on the
mesa during which you climb about 400 feet in elevation. My house is a little over 3 miles from the
entrance and another 240 feet lower. So
that’s roughly 4.3 miles, a distance that is really nothing on a road bike even
in the heat of summer for someone who rides even a modest amount. But that 640-foot climb, that’s another thing
altogether.
NCAR sits atop a mesa in the foothills above Boulder with
the Flat Iron mountain range, literally the front range of the Rockies, framing
it behind. It’s an impressive
sight. And for a biker, at least for
this biker, it is a beckoning objective.
Countless runners and bikers have made the journey up the mesa and back
down again. Scores do it every day. Some do it multiple times in a day. But I had only attempted it a couple times
and always turned back, making it no further than halfway. I told myself it represented a milestone for
me. If I could make it up NCAR, then I
had attained something as a biker – some badge of accomplishment.
To serious bikers, NCAR is probably little more than a warm-up. By “serious bikers” I do not mean the elite
international athletes who compete in the Tour and Giro. I’m talking about any old committed
road-biker around Boulder. And there are
loads of them. But to me, making it up
NCAR meant something.
So there I was, catching my breath, rivulets of sweaty
sunscreen running into my eyes, hoping the electrolyte mix in my water bottle
could somehow renew my strength, agreeing with my inner voice as it told me that
my heart and lungs were making a lot of sense.
I made it this far and this was
far enough.
Beyond the older man ahead of me, I could see a more
conditioned athlete coast down the final stretch, then turn around and sprint
back to the top. He had passed me about
half a mile back and he was probably already on his third or fourth sprint
cycle at the top.
Have you ever experienced that optical illusion when you’re
stopped at a light and the car next to you glides forward a little and, for a
split second, even though you know you have your foot on the brake, your brain
tells you that you are rolling backward not that he’s moving forward? Yeah.
That’s about what it felt like when he dashed past me.
I took another gulp and watched another fellow who had
already successfully crested the top whiz by as he flew back down the
hill. The road is steep enough that it’s
easy to get above 30 on the way down. In
fact, you probably can’t stay under 30 unless you’re on the brakes. Road bikes don’t have disk brakes, they have
the style of rubber-shoe rim brakes that most people are familiar with. On a long, steep grade you can pick up so
much speed downhill that, if you stay on the brakes and don’t alternate pulses between
the front and rear, you can easily overheat the brakes, cooking the rim and
melting the rubber shoes.
“I did good. Halfway is good,” I told myself. “This
is far enough for today. It’s a milestone
for me to pass next time. Yeah. Let’s join that guy on the flight back
down. It’s the best part, after all.” The voice told me the last half was the
hardest half. I looked back up to the
top and agreed. Then glanced over at the
raven and he agreed, too, though maybe for different reasons. “Take a
load off, man. Just lie down here beside
the bike lane and I’ll take of the rest.”
I had already been talking my way through each pump of the
peddle for the last few minutes. Just make it to that pull off and we can
rest… okay, we still have a little something left in the tank so let’s make it
to the next flat and take a breather… alright, still going, still going… this
is good, this is good because when you finally do stop you can take comfort in
the fact that you made it that whole way without resting. It really is amazing, the self-talk. I’m not really exaggerating about this – some
part of my brain is trying to use reason to win an argument with some
less-reasonable part of my brain that is determined to prove something. Reason was winning. And then I looked back.
The
blistering sun brilliantly lit the entire valley and the cloudless sky provided
a clear view down the hill, across the whole of Boulder, and out into the
plains beyond. We can overuse and misuse the word, literally, but this view was literally inspiring.
Photo by HotBlack at MorgueFile.com |
From the bottom, your perspective is different. When you begin, the last half looks the steepest. But, looking back, it’s clear that the
toughest leg is already behind you. How many
of those who set out surrender too soon thinking they barely made a dent in the
NCAR climb?
I had already completed most of the work. I stuffed my drink back in the cage and my
towel in its pocket, clipped back into the pedals, and bid the raven adieu.
I’d be lying if I said the last leg was a cakewalk. It was work, but it was doable work. For a couple minutes back there, the raven
and reason nearly talked me into believing it was insurmountable, not worth the
continued effort on that day feeling that way.
But I can say with complete candor that the final hundred yards were surprisingly
easy. I felt stronger, as if the exertion
of the miles behind me fell away. Like
there was a wind at my back. I had been
grinding it out in my lowest of 30 gears for most of the climb, but toward the
end I clicked up one gear then another then another then another.
When I stopped – no, when I paused, because that's all it was – when I paused, if I had focused exclusively
on the work that awaited me, I probably would have quit. Like I had every time before. But looking back allowed me to appreciate how
far I had already come. My own progress,
the results of my own hard work, inspired me on for that last push. And where did that get me? It got me to the top. I accomplished the goal I had originally set for
myself five years earlier and had stopped even attempting because it had
defeated and humbled me the first few times I tried.
I used to say the race back down was the reward for the
grueling haul up - the wind in my face and especially the speed meter flashing at me at the bottom to let me know I was going well beyond 25mph. I wanted to shout encouragement to every person still huffing their way up. It was fun. But the real reward was at the top. I made it.
I looked down at where I had been, at how far I’d come.
I took well-deserved pride in overcoming a truly difficult
obstacle – not the mesa climb itself, but my own internal urge to give up.
Sometimes looking back is better.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
Melting The Pounds Away
I've abandoned even the pretext of writing short, snappy blog posts. Everything grows in the telling for me. I can only hope to make these longer ones entertaining enough to engage you through to the end.
Alphonse Mucha's Woman With A Burning Candle |
We’ve all heard the words – Melt those pounds away. Like
it’s just as easy as that. The promise of
that swimsuit body in a few short weeks melts away billions of dollars from our wallets every year.
I’m thinking about this because I recently got back to
exercising after several months of storing up fat for the winter and testing
the elastic range of my abdominal skin. I
can report I succeeded smashingly in both regards. Now it’s down to the difficult work of
reestablishing a consistent exercise routine so I can recover my youthful physique. Confession:
I was a stickboy in my youth, so I’m not really aiming for that specific
physique, but it’s just an expression, like sick as a dog, piss like a racehorse,
or throw someone under the bus. We say
the words even if they aren’t literally true.
As we all know, it is far easier to blame external forces
than to correct internal shortcomings, but I can’t help wonder if my challenge
is more than one of mere laziness and procrastination. The very laws of nature conspire against me. Against us.
I don’t just mean the inevitable wasting effects of age – the aches
& the pains, increased recovery time & diminishing returns for your
efforts – I am chalking this up to the inescapable truths of Newtonian Physics.
You know where I’m going with this – Newton noted, in
simplified form, that natural objects possess a natural desire is to resist
change:
- An Object in Motion tends to remain in motion unless acted on by an outside force. With regard to exercise, this is the state in which you have established a regular and satisfying routine that is self-perpetuating because it calls to you every day. You may feel sore, but it’s a satisfying soreness.
- On the other hand, an Object at Rest – one that is gradually boring a bum-shaped crater into the couch – tends to remain at rest unless it too is acted on by an outside force. Picture a pool ball and a cue.
It’s this outside
force that I am in search of. I
asked a circle of writer friends recently if any would be willing to help hold me accountable
to establishing a regular writing routine and, to my surprise, I received no
takers and no small measure of scorn for the very suggestion. I intended to set my own goals - goals I truly wanted to achieve. I simply wanted their help to remind and prod
and encourage me to work toward them. If interested, maybe I could do the same for them.
Iron sharpening iron. Perhaps that was the unspoken deal-breaker.
I don’t fully understand what the push-back was about. Maybe it was my own uneven history of accountability with them. I do think some writers believe the creative process
is so inviolate that they can be uncomfortable with the very idea of externally imposed
requirements. I have come to view writing as more an
act of will and intentional creative expression rather than one of transient
inspiration, but I’ll leave that for another discussion another time.
Regarding accountability, I understand it is the inner
drive that ultimately matters most in whether we remain at Newtonian rest, physically
and figuratively, or we get ourselves in motion and create habits and and environment that keeps us motion. Establishing that supportive external environment that motivates you to fulfill your inner desires produces more results than relying on your own will alone. External
accountability and motivation never hurts.
So, to that end, I began tracking my food intake via Weight Watchers online AND I also got a
Nike+ Fuelband activity monitor that
I wear all the time. Both of these tools
provide regular reminders of whether my present choices are contributing to or
detracting from progress toward my goals.
They are external forces of accountability to support me when my inner drive is having an off day.
With weight loss I’ve had more success than writing thus far
this year. It’s been two weeks and I am
down 4 pounds, 2 per week. I am very
pleased with that progress – it is both healthy and sustainable. Crash, fad diets usually turn out to be
neither healthy nor sustainable.
But, it’s not all rainbows and roses. The physical and dietary work itself isn’t as
hard on my body as my self-judgment is on my psyche. We are usually our own worst critics. The mirror is a daily reminder of our past choices and it can be easier to focus on regrets rather than your present course.
For anyone who has lost weight, perhaps you can relate to
the following experience. Two weeks into successfully shedding pounds I
actually feel and look flabbier than when I started. I'm serious. I am physically going in the right direction, but aesthetically I am literally sagging.
I’m not repugnant, at least not any more so than I was two
weeks ago, but I feel less…
alluring. The scale assures me
otherwise, but we haven’t yet established a rapport, the scale and I, where I have
confidence he’s entirely on my side. He
must know that once I reach my goal I won’t consult him every morning like I do now
and, between you and me, I worry he may become a bit clingy. We are still working through some trust issues –
like how over the course of the week I can be up a pound one day, down a pound
and a half the next, even, up, down, and so on. It’s
like watching the astronauts in Apollo 13 try to keep the Earth centered in the
window as they hurdle back from the moon with no steering on their booster
rockets – it swings wildly back and forth until it finally settles on the money shot
for the weekly Monday weigh-in.
Picture from StockFreeImages.com |
Weight loss products enthusiastically claim they will Melt The Pounds Away. Sounds great.
But have you ever seen a candle melt? That might be exactly what you want for a romantic dinner, peaceful
bath, or secluded monastery, but not what you want to see reflected in the mirror. Melted wax rolls over the edges, slides down
the sides and puddles around the bottom.
Picture that on a human body, if you will.
As my fat thins it no longer presses my skin taut so that everything now sags and swings like never before. My belly used to protrude a bit above my
belt. Now, as they’d say in the South,
it done laps right over. It’s like an
abdominal waterfall breaking over my waistband.
In the past, I joked about
maintaining My Girlish Figure. But now that I have bouncier man-boobs and a
bowls full of jelly gyrating around my hips and caboose, I can say with
certainty that the classic hourglass shape is not exactly what I was going for. Nor is the pear-shape, which is probably
closer to the truth for me. Have you
seen an elephant seal shimmy-flopping up a beach? Yeah.
Then you know my hidden pain.
This is a transitional period, I know that, but the watch-it-wiggle-see-it-jiggle phase does
little to encourage me back into the gym where I must wallow amongst the typical
crowd of hard-bodied, tri-athlete Boulderites that populate the gyms around these
parts. But I know I have to look past
this present hardship to a brighter future and accept myself along the way.
In one of my favorite Seinfeld scenes, Cosmo Kramer has been
coaxed by a big tobacco company into the role of a rugged Marlboro Man-type ad model
and he has literally taken to smoking like it is his job. He sets up a smoking lounge in his apartment,
where he chain-puffs away on a pipe all day long. Jerry confronts him about how he has crammed
an entire lifetime of smoking into just a few short days and it is ravaging
his face. He comments that Kramer’s skin
now looks like a worn-out catcher’s mitt and his teeth are stained a repulsive shade
of brown. Horror-struck at what he has
done to himself, Kramer laments:
“Jerry, you know my face is my livelihood. Everything I have I owe to this face! It’s my allure. My... my twinkle.”
Then he famously concludes with the imminently quotable
line, “Look away, Jerry! I’m hideous!”
I hold no misgivings that my face is my twinkle, but I do
understand his remorse over regrettable choices. I have become Cosmo
Kramer. Please avert your eyes
awhile. I feel hideous.
Getting older is really getting old. And if aging has taught me nothing else it is this - in pretty much everything in life, it is always easier to Keep Up than it is to Catch Up.
Picture from Red Cross of Argentina |
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Peckers and Baloney Ponies
In the next few paragraphs, you will note the frequent inclusion of [_] within the text. This is for my more delicate readers. Please feel free to insert the expletive
of your choosing wherever you see a [_] and just know that the saltier version is exactly how I recount this story in my head. But my mother
and wife read this blog, so I’d never hear the end of it if I let that filth
appear nakedly in print. So insert expletives or don't as you like. Then take a moment to
marvel at how I can make you mentally insert a word you’re not actually even reading. Try to read past the [_] and see how that
works. The mind is a magnificent
mystery.
For a couple weeks every [_] spring, some damnable [_] Woodpecker
piece of [_] drums away on my metal [_] chimney cap like it’s his [_] job! He starts banging at around 6:30 right outside my window! 6:30! No joke.
What kind of [_]-up mother-[_] has the energy to repeatedly slam his [_] peabrain
against a sheet of metal at the ass crack of dawn? I mean, really!
Photo from TotalWildlifeControl.com |
He usually takes a break for a couple hours only to resume
his [_] provocation – because that’s exactly what this is; it’s a [_] provocation! That [_] Woodpecker is calling me out! He’s [_] mocking me because I’m stuck to the
[_] surface of the Earth while he flies [_] circles around my head taunting me
and my impotent [_] broom!
And he’s a wily son of a [_], to boot. Somehow he knows when my preschooler or my wife
(who works nights) lays down for a nap! He
[_] knows! Every [_] time! How does he know? How the [_] do I know? I just know he knows, the insidious pecker-head!
And here’s the kicker – he also knows that I can’t [_] shout
because that would only add to the noise disturbing my family’s sleep. He just looks down his [_] beak at me like I'm some [_] dancing marionette, whisper-shouting like an idiot.
So I wave a [_] broom in the air like a [_] trained
monkey and toss stones and all he does is flutter to a nearby tree where he’s
above it all, that superior [_]. He just waits for me to go
back inside then returns to his torture. Sometimes he
doesn’t even bother leaving for a tree when I harass him, he’ll just fly around the other side of
the house and hammer away on a downspout or a gutter or some flashing.
I was raised in the suburbs.
As much as I understand some of the costs to society of being so far removed
from the sources of our food on the farm, I appreciate the fact that I don't have to butcher my own
livestock. But I tell you, if I could
get my hands on that little pecker-head, I would ring his [_] neck like a hardened farmhand
and not lose a wink of sleep over it.
I asked an animal control guy about it one time and he said
there’s usually two related reasons a woodpecker knocks on metal – it’s either
a territorial display to impress rival males or, most likely this time of year,
he’s trying to attract a mate. Can you believe that [_], he’s driving me ape[_] crazy in order to impress a girl! It’s
just a [_] booty call!
This [_] pecker has a high hard one and my family gets to
suffer his [_] machine-gun serenade until he gets some satisfaction.
My roof is just his hook-up spot. The expert assured me that, once he gets a
little yum-yum, he’ll move along and lose all interest in emasculating me in
front of my exhausted family. Until next
spring, that is, when the horny pecker gets another hankering for a honey pot.
So, this morning, I’m cursing and waving my broom around and,
naturally, I got to thinking about the space program.
Did you ever wonder what scientific value there was for
shooting men at the moon? No doubt that
it was totally awesome. That’s
undeniable. But what did we find there that was so vital we
needed to do it six times?
There was the space race, of course. The Soviet Union was eating America’s lunch
and we’d had about enough of it. But
there had to be more to it. The space program is
such a noble enterprise – the highest example of mankind’s fundamental drive to
shine a light on the dark parts of the map.
I always assumed the space race was just the cause célèbre that
rallied support, but that a greater scientific purpose lie behind the
mission. Kennedy just needed something
to inspire the American people and prove to the world that we took a backseat
to nobody. So he looked around, found
a bunch of astronomers with a dream but no funding, and tapped them to carry the baton of American exceptionalism awhile. Right? Nope.
Turns out the awesomeness of it was
pretty much the whole story. The scientific value of
landing humans on the moon was minimal; certainly nothing that couldn’t be
accomplished far more easily, safely, and cost-effectively with probes and robotic rovers. Whatever scientific
value the moon landings did possess was secondary, at best, and completely
insufficient to justify the enormous expenditure of financial and intellectual resources.
So why did we go to the moon? As George Mallory famously answered in response to being asked why climb Mount Everest:
Because it’s there.
In effect, we did it to win a pissing contest. It was a cockfight. A territorial display. Bragging rights. It was America beating its chest to its
rivals and, frankly, to itself. There are few symbols more phallically fitting than a rocket blasting into space or planting our flag in virgin soil.
“Fix bayonets, boys, we’re taking that trench.” [double-entendre intended]
Photo seen on LikeCool.com |
This reasoning doesn’t sound particularly noble, but it is distinctly human. No, that's not right. It is more than human, it is universal to the sexual fabric of life on Earth.
A boy will do unpredictable things to impress a girl.
A man will attempt feats of insanity to prove he’s a
man.
How many great stories begin right there? How many adventures? How many wars?
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