Massive Attack
It struck like lightning.
I was fresh from Stella, strawberries, and the New York City Philharmonic — complete with fireworks — on the Great Lawn.
I had just walked — maybe “swam” would be a better choice of words — across Central Park, and climbed five sweaty flight of stairs to my apartment (listening, it’s worth noting, to Death Cab For Cutie’s “Crooked Teeth” on repeat the whole way).
I stepped into my air conditioned apartment, and sighed with relief. I put down my bag (Blackberry, extra Pro Keds, New York, Esquire, and Giant magazines), and reached for the freezer. I pulled out a carton of Breyers Vanilla, reached for a clean bowl and OUCH! Mother fucker!
I paused — ice cream in one hand, clean bowl in the other — and assessed from where the pain was coming. ‘Stabbing sensation, upper left shoulder blade, epecially painful when I inhale.’
I tried to stretch it out: raising my left arm over my head, touching my toes. Nothing.
Then, of course, I moved on to terminal diseases. Heart attack? Cancer?
When pain finds me out of nowhere (ie: not after a race of some sort), I always wonder what the psychological implications are. Or, more succinctly, I wonder what the physical implications of psychology are. I’m a strong believer that we carry stresses and emotion in our bodies. Seems to make sense to accupuncturists, messeurs, and yoga practitioiners, right? Why wouldn’t internalize our psychology? Our issues? Our stuff? And so I wonder what baggage I’ve stored up there on my left shoulder blade.
Of course, it could be just that I’m getting old.
Hot August Night
For a second, I can imagine I¹m sitting next to Carole King, John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Which I guess makes me the dude from Herman’s Hermits. Or maybe Neil Diamond.
The best part about seeing the Pixies (and later Wilco) perform at Hollywood’s famed Greek Theater was finally having visuals to accompany the audio of Neil Diamond’s stellar live CD, “Hot August Night.” The Greek is a beautiful amphitheater nestled into a wooded hillside above Los Angeles, just below Griffith Observatory (where James Dean fought for Natalie Wood in the 1955 classic, “Rebel Without a Cause”) and the Hollywood sign (where, my colleague Angela argues, The Terrorists will strike next). On the recording he says, “This one’s for the tree people.” Neil was looking out for the freeloaders too.
Neil started his career in the ’60s as a $50/week staff songwriter for Sunbeam Music. He worked in the Brill Building, just a few blocks north of my office at The MTV, alongside songwriters Neil Sedaka, Leiber and Stoller, and Carole King.
There was a workhorse aesthetic to songwriting back then. It was a day job. Songwriter Barry Mann described the place thusly:
Cynthia and I worked in a tiny cubicle, with just a piano and a chair, no window. We’d go in every morning and write songs all day. In the next room Carole and Gerry were doing the same thing, with Neil in the room after that. Sometimes when we all get to banging pianos, you couldn’t tell who was playing what.
And it worked. The songwriter teams cranked out dozens of great songs, including “Breaking Up Is Hard To Do,” “I’m A Believer,” “Will You Love Me Tomorrow,” “Take Good Care Of My Baby,” and “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin,’” among many other.
Which brings us back onstage at The Bitter End.
New York City can be a tough town in which to find your place. I always say that it’s that much more difficult to be the best, say, novelist in New York, when Tom Wolfe and Toni Morrison are reading at Shakespeare & Co. just down the street. Similarly, it’s tough to find a scene. I’m not talking disco balls and guys in makeup. I’m talking about comradery. I’m talking about support. I’ve performed in New York City for nearly ten years, and missed most scenes twice. I was a heartbeat away from The Strokes making the world safe for Interpol. And I was just around the corner from the singer/songwriter wave of the early 00′s (Norah Jones, Jesse Harris, Jesse Malin). On any given night, Ryan Adams might be playing an acoustic set down the street at Lakeside Lounge, and Michael Stipe might be dropping in on Dashboard Confessional at Arlene Grocery.
Which brings us back onstage at The Bitter End. Almost.
I’ve gone it alone for over ten years. I’ve built and re-built bands, dragged amplifiers up and down subway stairwells, and logged thousands of miles alone from Chicago to Chapel Hill to Rochester, in a rental car. I won’t mice words: it’s lonesome. You need teammates.
Now, I’m not taking credit for anything, ‘cuz Amy’s been building community for years, and Casey and Jeff found each other, and found Amy’s vast sphere of influence. I just glommed on. But I’ve done everything I can to contribute to this circle of friends, from hosting a monthly Sunday Songwriters Gathering (beer and guacamole on my roof), to nominating them for every open slot a booking agent offers me.
And so, there we were, sitting onstage in the musical neighborhood Bob Dylan built. And I’m nervous, so I’m chatty. And I’m a little bit silly. But then Amy asks me to sing with her and I’m reverential, ‘cuz I love the song, and I believe in her. We’re a songwriting team. The bunch of us are a scene. We are comrades.
There in the spotlight, Michelle has soul, and Amy has heart, and Casey has brains, and me? Well, I guess that makes me the Cowardly Lion. The good news is that sittin’ next to this crew, it was pretty easy to find a little extra courage.
Killing Yourself To Live
It really doesn’t take much to rescue one’s self from melancholic exile.
It’s a self-imposed exile, really. I’ve withdrawn, I’ll hand it to you. The reasons are complicated, and personal, and the kind of thing I’m not going to give away for free. They’re well-intentioned. Chopping wood, carrying water — that sorta’ thing.
Yesterday wasn’t terribly fun, but it did pick up. I got a haircut from my rocknroll stylist Andrew at New York Hair. I walk in, bed-headed from an AC-fueled afternoon power nap (all that laundry was exhausting), and he greets me at the front door. Led Zeppelin is on the stereo. The place is hoppin’. Andrew is pushing fifty. He has hair like mine, but grayer and thinner. His ears are pierced. He wears heavy jewelry. He speaks with a thick Queens accent. I love him to death.
Even if I want to, I can’t be melancholy (noun: Sadness or depression of the spirits; gloom). Andrew’s schooling me on Procal Harum, Taj Majal, Derek & The Dominos. He’s telling me stories about meeting Ringo (“Ringo Starr?” I ask. “No,” Andrew says, “Ringo Schwartz.”), and hangin’ out with Mick. He’s done acid at Altamont, shrooms at The Garden. It’s a first-person tour through “Hammer of the Gods” in the eyes of an Upper West Side mensch. What’s not to love?
I walk out well shorn and energized. I decide to check out the shoe store, see what’s going on in men’s shoes these days. Truth be told, I love shoes. And jackets. Given my druthers, and unlimited resources, I’d have lots of both. I’m thinking maybe I’ll find a nice, summery suede number. No dice. So I step into Barnes & Noble. I’m in the market for the new Klosterman book, so what the heck.
There’s a stunning blonde with killer cheekbones at the magazine rack. I circle a minute, peering sideways through my dark sunglasses while trying not to run into anyone. A handsome, dark-haired, European looking guy steps up to her and she smiles. I regain my task orientation. I pick up Klosterman’s book, “Killing Yourself To Live” — the last copy on the shelf — and browse a bit more. I pick up Douglas Coupland’s “Generation X.” I haven’t read it in fifteen years. I figure maybe it’s time to revisit. The woman at the checkout is, bafflingly, immune to my charms. She sends me on my way with barely any eye contact.
Back home on the couch, I tear into Klosterman’s book. I know his writing from Spin and Esquire, but mostly I know him from a certain ex. She worshipped him, which created some resistence in me. So it’s with some surprise that I find myself feeling like I’ve found a long-lost brother. He writes like me, only better (more pop culture references, and way funnier). He thinks like me (only more absurd and way funnier). He runs, for Christ’s sake, for the same reasons I do (“Running keeps me alive. Physically, I almost never enjoy the process of exercise, but I feel mentally tougher when I finish. More importantly, running lets me eat anything I want, and it allows me to drink every day.”). And he’s in love with three women at once (I’m not, but I can empathize). He quotes Jeff Tweedy on the regular to boot.
Chuck Klosterman, where have you been all my life?
The book is a Kerouacian tale of love and death in which our hero, Klosterman, loads himself and 600 compact discs into a rented Ford Taurus and visit places where rock icons have died: Mud Island, Memphis (Jeff Buckley), Clear Lake, Iowa (Buddy Holly), and Minneapolis, Minnesota (Bob Stinson). But Klosterman rambles eloquently, and hilariously, on everything that pops into his dyslexic mind and heart. He may as well be blogging. Only he’s not. He’s taking a road trip, and writing a novel, and getting paid handsomely for it. Good for him. I love it.
Before I know it, I’m in a pretty good mood. And I have an idea. Something I’ve read puts the phrase “caught the sadness” in my head. I start thinking of melancholy like it’s a virus, something you get from kissing someone, or sharing a straw. And I think, “I’m gonna’ go upstairs and write a song.”
I wrestle with my minimal outlet real estate, trading my modem and desk lamp for my drum machine and amp. I seek out a beat, something simple but propellant. I let my hands slide along the guitar until I find something worth playing. It’s nothing. It’s two barre chords: E and D. But they sound amazing. So I record ‘em over and over for three minutes. Then I arpeggiate an open E over both. It takes the song somewhere else completely. Then I put down two big, fat bass hooks. Now I’m cookin’. Now I’m excited. I sing a few lines of “yeahs” and “ooohs” in harmony. I’m onto something. A song is coming together. I feel alive. I feel awake. I feel happy.
I pace on the deck listening to my infant song. It’s strident. It’s defiant. I wants to drive fast, and live hard. It wants to survive. And so It finds it’s own words.
I’ve been down and I’ve been sad
I’ve been kicked around and left for dead
I’ve been dumb and I’ve lost my head
But I brought myself right back again
Before I know it, it’s 9:30, and I haven’t eaten dinner. I’ve recorded twenty-four tracks. “Falling Backwards” is not rocket science, but it does rock. I can’t imagine a scenario in which I will release it on an album (it goes on the posthumous outtakes release with “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” “I Bleed,” “Difference,” and all the others too something to release). And I can’t imagine a scenario in which this song didn’t come to be. I feel like I filled up on all this terrible bile, then let it pour out into something positive. Neither could have existed with out the other, and so it’s all worth it. It’s all ok. It just is.
Your Love Is Gonna Drown
I set myself up for melancholy from the word go.
My weekend beach plans fell through, so I was in no hurry to leave The MTV. I was filling out a CRF (computer request form) when it occurred to me that the office was a ghost town, and that filling out a CRF on a Friday night is pathetic. So I put “I Will Follow You Into The Dark” on repeat, slipped through the gawking Times Square tourists, and descended into the sweltering subway.
If Heaven and Hell decide that they both are satisfied
Illuminate the no on their vacancy signs
If there’s no one beside you when your soul embarks
I’ll follow you into the dark
My Big Friday Night Plan, I decided, was to throw a little dinner party. For one: me. So I wrestled with the gray hairs at Fairway (the only strategy there, really, is to laugh if off; otherwise you’d go postal) for a salmon fillet, some fresh green beans, salad, and rice pilaf. I hit the corner store for charcoal and a six of Stella. Party on.
I watched the sunset. I drank a lot of beer. I grilled up the salmon. I listened to a lot of Death Cab. And I went to bed.
I dreamt about Erin. We got married. The ceremony was full of joy. I was thrilled. I was comfortable, and happy. I spun my wedding ring around my finger. I loved how it looked and felt. Driving away afterwards, I looked down and the gold had flaked away. It was just a tarnished, pewter-colored ring.
Sorrow drips into your heart from a pinhole
Just like a faucet that leaks
And there is comfort in the sound
But while you debate half-empty and half-full
Your love is gonna drown
I woke up early. I lay in bed a while thinking about her. I Googled her just to see her photo. I sat on the floor sorting dirty laundry, walked downstairs and started my day. I had to laugh when I saw the kitchen: dishes stacked four-high, empty beer bottles, a hollow ice cream carton. And that was that. This is this. Today, I am an acoustic guitar and a small, sad voice in a big, empty room. And that’s ok. It’s gotta’ be.
I Will Follow You Into The Dark
I had the most beautiful dream last night. Still, it scared me just a little bit.
I lived in Telluride, CO, a tiny mining-turned-resort town tucked nearly 9000 feet into a tiny corner of the San Juan range, during the summer between my junior and senior years in college. At 9078 feet, the Telluride Regional Airport is the highest commercial airport in the United States. I used to drive up there to look at the stars, but I never landed there until well after college (two weeks before I started at The MTV, as a matter of fact). As you can imagine, a runway tucked on the side of a mountain doesn’t accommodate very large planes. It’s mostly twin props and some small private jets.
In the dream, I’m in a luxury condo high above town. In fact, the vantage point of the dream is from the western edge of the box canyon where the terrain prohibits development. But it’s a dream, so anything goes.
I’m looking out over the valley from the front door. Way down a long, steep driveway, my family is packing to leave. An enormous DC-9 swoops in over my shoulder, banking left just above the tree line. I had three thoughts in the dream: ‘That plane is too low, too big, and banking too early to make the airport.’
It barely clears the pine trees in my front yard, when I see a man straddling the tail section. He’s nearly as large as the plane. And he’s naked. It’s like a da Vinci / Magritte mash up. It’s startling, and beautiful.
Still, the plane’s too low, too big, and banking too early. I’m anticipating a crash. Instead, just as the plane disappears below the ridgeline, our neighbors pull up in a station wagon. They’re frantic. Their youngest child, barely a toddler, is scraped up, and unconscious. They lay him down on the driveway, kneeling over him. I summons my mother, who is in fact, and in the dream, an RN. She attends to the child, and the hysterical family, and all is well.
Later, the drama has passed. I’ve come down the mountain to town for a beer with my father and brother. I’m telling them about a business trip that I arranged to hang out with my high school friends Jon and Sibby and in Telluride. My dad laughs, and says, “Good deal, if you arrange it.” And then it’s time for me to catch my plane. But once again (see Wednesday’s post), I can’t get to the airport. My car breaks down. I find a payphone, but my father isn’t answering. I’ve lost my brother’s number. Knowing full well that I’m going to miss my flight, I begin walking along the highway into the inky black night.
I wake up about seventy-five feet above sea level. It’s barely six o’clock. I can’t fall back to sleep. I start my day a little bit shaken.
Set The Moon
It’s one o’clock in the morning. Producer Guy Benny and I are toiling on my forthcoming EP, “The Rivington Sessions,” when I turn to him and say, “At least let me buy you dinner.”
“Nah, I’m fine, thanks,” Guy says. “I think there’s a Pepsi in the fridge.”
It was that kind of night. Guy and I worked into the small hours of morning fueled solely by Pepsi, Pacifico, and the hope that something kinda’ magical was happening.
The Space is an old Vaudeville theater on the Lower East Side just north of the Williamsburg Bridge on Rivington and Attorney. Guy and fellow Dough band mate Walker T. Pettibone have converted the 7500 square foot theater space — complete with 90-foot ceilings — into a recording studio with a few rehearsal rooms.
Truth be told, it’s a bit of a ratty space. The walls are tagged with graffiti. The floors are covered with tattered rugs, and strewn with instrument cables and amplifiers. The bathroom is a port-a-john in the garage. But it lends the space some Boho Chic. It feels a little edgy because, well, it is a little edgy. It’s the LES.
We got rolling around nine o’clock or so. I was playing live to tape. Guy had me singing into a beautiful Neumann, and playing into two unidirectional AKGs. I was alone in this huge space. Guy was in my headphones, and on a TV monitor just over my shoulder.
“So what are we goin’ for here,” he asked.
“I’m just trying to capture a few moments,” I said. “I don’t want to be too precious about it. Basically, a bum chord or a major league off note is all that’s gonna’ force us to take it again.”
I started with “Harder To Believe,” which I got in two takes. “Milk & Honey” was a little more challenging. I played my first pass a little too big. “Sorry dude, lemme’ take it again.” Guy called me on it. “Dude, never apologize for wanting to get it right.” Good advises. I got it on the second take.
I couldn’t hear all that well in my headphones, but best as I could tell, my voice was doing what it’s supposed to, and then some. The great thing about good mics is that they enable you to lay off all of the projection you’re usually saddled with. They don’t need to be able to hear you in the back of the theater. You can whisper in tune and it’ll sound pretty cool.
“I think we’re capturing some magic here, dude.”
Now, I love Guy, but in the moment, I was a little dubious. Producers are supposed to be supportive. I mean, are you going to perform better when someone gives you props, or knocks your chops? Duh. Still, it did sound fine to me. But what do I know? What can I tell? Weird, right? I’ve been singing for twenty years (my whole life, really), and releasing records since I was twenty. Still, there is something kind of mysterious about it. I don’t really have any control over it, in a weird sort of way. I hear golf is like that: the less you think about it, the better you do. Anyway, I appreciated Guy’s support.
There was a whole lot of chaos swirling around the studio concurrent to my recording. A band was rehearsing downstairs. Guy did his best to block out their sound, erecting huge walls of soundproofing, blankets and pillows. Dudes kept knocking on the door. The phone was ringing off the hook. But somehow, oddly, I remained calm. Even though what we were doing was permanent, the stakes weren’t that high. It was just one moment. I think my audience — you? — get that. And everything was flowing.
Which doesn’t mean I wasn’t asking myself, ‘Did that just suck?’ I was, and it may have. I guess I’ve been writing, recording and performing songs long enough to know that “Dear Elizabeth” is going to sound different on a sweltering summer night in a Vaudeville theatre on the Lower East Side than it will at a living room performance in a swank Cleveland apartment.
After a few false starts, I nailed “Cry” in its first full run through. Guy said he dug the tune, which was great to hear, ‘cuz, to me, its one of my most risky. I tried really hard to not even think about what’s cool or not when I wrote it, which shows.
Cry if you want to
You’re not losing a friend
I’ll never leave you
I remember you when
I couldn’t save you
No miracle came through
We had to save ourselves
I mean, that some earnest stuff. And it sounds it. I was hushed as I sang it, almost whispering. I strummed as lightly as possible. In the end, I guess it was kind of a magical moment after all.
One of the reasons I wanted to record at The Space, in addition to Guy’s producing skills, and the vibe of the room, is their gear. They’re pretty tricked out: racks and racks of old school, analogue affects. And Guy didn’t disappoint. He pulled out the big gun: the EMT 140 reverb plate. “I know how you like Dylan,” he said later. “He used the EMT a lot.” It’s basically a huge slab of metal with a few speakers, a few microphones, and a mechanism to vibrate the plate, all within a big wooden box. That’s the difference between demoing at home, and recording with Guy. That’s the stuff that makes a record a record.
Of course, it’s not just the equipment, or the space, that makes a record. And I guess that’s my point. It’s opening up to the experience, and the variables: the shape of the moon, the weight of the air, the quality of light. But it’s also the sweat, and love of the guys stepping out of the recording studio — stomachs empty, body numb, heads spinning — into the first signs of morning. That’s what makes a record.
And it is. Or it will be. A record, I mean. It’s gonna’ be called “The Rivington Sessions.” Guy’s mixing tonight, and mastering tomorrow. Secret Agent Josephine is already hard at work on the album cover. Then? Not sure. I may release a few hard copies (aka, actual CDs), but principally, it’s for iTunes. Scratch that. Principally, “The Rivington Sessions” is for you.
Summer Skin
Something about the quality of light tonight reminded me of summers in Oak Park.
Dusk is deceptive. Everything turns deep blue. Shadows and light blend into one. Depth fades. We scramble through backyards blindly, illuminated solely by the flicker of fireflies, and surrounded by the sound of children’s laughter.
Oak Park, Illinois, the first suburb west of Chicago, was, at its best, a True American Neighborhood. There were kids everywhere. We formed football leagues. We sold lemonade. We roller-skated, built forts, and climbed trees. The greatest evil to befall Forest Avenue, there in the shadow of Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and studio, was neighborhood bully Gary Garber. The worst thing he ever did was break a window or two.
I was eight-years-old. The world was just a few blocks wide then. Sean and Dusty Well, Joe and Jon Champelli, David Wright, Cindy, Katie and Billy Myers, Chris and I were the sole population of that world. Summers afternoons found us gathered in front of our house playing Wiffle ball. As the sun fell, and the last ball swirled down the storm drain, we repaired to the Myers tree-lined backyard for all-night games of Kick The Can.
Oak Park, Illinois, was also the End of Innocence. It was there in the front room of 550 Forest Avenue that my parents sat Chris and I down to tell us they were divorcing. Not that it should have come as any surprise. But it did.
Tonight, though, riding the bus through Central Park as the last strains of sunlight filtered through the trees, I went back there for a second. Everything turned deep blue. Shadow and light blended into one. Depth faded. In my mind, I scrambled blindly through those backyards again. The world shrank to just a few blocks wide, and I could almost hear Dusty yell through the darkness, “Ollie ollie oxen free!!!”
Bittersweet Me
I shook myself from sleep at 5:42 this morning. I was dreaming about airplanes.
Well, not exactly. Not solely. I never made it to the airplane. I was dreaming about airports.
It was a two-parter. In the first scene, I am hurrying to some regional airport — say, Syracuse — for a ten o’clock flight. My car breaks down. So I’m jogging through some suburban neighborhood at dusk looking for a ride. Some guy playing in his yard with his kids offers to take me. We get into his truck and, en route, he asks me to buy him a bottle of whiskey as compensation. I oblige, awkwardly. Once to the airport — with only ten minutes to spare — I discover my flight departed five hours ago.
Second scene: different airport, next morning. I’m trying to find the ticket counter. It’s a labarynth. The agent is a dolt. It costs a fortune to get a new ticket. The entire experience is somewhere between Kafka and Monte Python. I’m frantic, harried, unsettled. I can’t find my gate. I sit and talk with some colleagues a while, then head for my flight. When I realize I’ve left my bag with them, I circle back, but they’re gone. And so is the bag. And I can’t find my gate. I’m running in circles. I stop for a moment when I see a full-fledged funeral procession heading down a jetway. I continue running in circles around the terminal, completely lost.
Then I shake my head unconsciously, as if to say, “No more!” And I wake up. And the sun is rising over my shoulder. And I feel disoriented. And I can’t fall back to sleep.
Now, those of you who’ve been playing along at home know that, thematically, this sorta’ thing’s not so new. It is an interesting variation on the much-heralded, much-dreaded, much-analyzed plane crash dream. Heck, I couldn’t even find the plane. That’s new.
But not too surprising, all things considered.
Bittersweet Symphony
I am strong enough, but I am not strong.
I’ve long advocated that mental fortitude can carry one any distance: a marathon, triathlon, whatever. And for the last six or seven years, that’s proven true. Yes, I run and ride perodically, every few days even. But do I train? Not a ton. Not really.
I do these races — the New York City Marathon, the Bellaplain Duathlon, the Montauk Trathlon, the New York City Triathlon — for a number of reasons. Sure, I like the bragging rights. Between rock shows and races, I have some pretty good answers for “What did you do this weekend?”
More importantly, though, I like the way the mind follows the body. Physical strength does translate to mental strength. When I’m having a tough go of it in life — a bad day at work, a rough patch in relationship — I know from my racing that it will pass. Eventually.
But every so often — and this morning was one of those “every so oftens” — I am reminded of my limitations. A few runs a week and a couple of rides does not training for a triathlon make. And my 33-year-old body, while not so bad, ain’t so good.
I put all kinds of crap in it. I was hangin’ out with a bunch of twentysomething rock stars. And trying to keep up. Seventy-two hours later I was swimming a mile in the Hudson, riding twenty-five on the West Side Highway, and running six in Central Park.
The result? Not terrible. I wasn’t dead last. For a guy who hasn’t swam since last September’s Malibu Triathlon, well, I did fine. And for a mountain biker amidst thousand dollar road bikes, well, I held up. But by the time the run came around, and the sun was blazing down on the East Side, well, I found my limits.
What did it feel like, running a 10k after swimming a mile and riding twenty-five? I was out of juice. Every step was a chore. My hips were burning. The pads of my feet were raw. My body said “No way,” but my mind said “You have to.” And so I did.
I walked long strides through water breaks, pouring one cup over my head, and drinking the other. I counted my footfalls. I focussed on the elapsing miles. And I reminded myself that it will pass. Eventually.
It did. And I’m fine.
Since the finish, I’ve eaten a ham, egg and cheese sandwhich, two salads, sushi, and a plate full of pasta. I drunken numerous bottles of Gatorade, and a few beers. I’ve taken exactly one hour-long power nap.
And I’ve listened to The Verve’s “Bittersweet Symphony” approximately twenty-three times. I’m not quite sure why.
No change, I can change
I can change, I can change
But I’m here in my mold, I am here in my mold
But I’m a million different people
From one day to the next
I can’t change my mold
No, no, no, no, no
I can. I do. And I must.
Something’s gotta’ give, or something’s gonna’ give.
‘Cuz my mind, and my body, are strong enough, but not strong.
Chin Up
How do I prepare for a morning of swimming, riding, and running?
I eat, drink, and sleep. And then do it again.
Tomorrow morning is my fifth New York City Triathlon. Used to be, I spent weeks preparing. I’d do laps at lunch, ride out to Jersey on weekends. Not so of late. I squeeze quick runs in before work, plus a few weekend duathlons. Thus, I am woefully unprepared.
Still, I know I’ll finish, which is all that matters. Heck, I’m leaving my stopwatch at home. But I know I’ll finish. Lately, when I’m running out of steam, I say to myself, ‘Courage,’ and push a little harder. So maybe then I run six miles instead of five, or do a dozen more sit-ups. Whatever. Seems to work.
I plucked the word from, of all places, “Batman Begins.” The film reminded me, of all things, of what courage means. Case you’ve forgotten, here’s a refresher:
cour·age (kûr-j): The state or quality of mind or spirit that enables one to face danger, fear, or vicissitudes with self-possession, confidence, and resolution; bravery.
See you at the end of this:
