Archive | Road Trip RSS feed for this section

Mudder4Life

23 Sep

I entered my first half marathon in the fall of 2008.  I had never run over five miles at one time, let alone be officially timed while running.  I had only started running as a way to tire out my Golden Retrievers, then I realized it was good, cheap exercise, and it was stoking some creative energy that I thought I had long since snuffed out.  The only reason I entered that half marathon was at the nudge from a friend who is without a doubt the most authentically warm, genuine and positive person I have the pleasure to know and I had not one good argument to tell her I couldn’t do it.  Plus, I was getting addicted to that runner’s high.  I know, gag me, but it’s real.

Since that race in 2008, I have run six half marathons, two of which where off-road trail halfs, and as of tonight, three Tough Mudders.  As my team, the mighty Mudtallica walked around Truckee this morning, we were chatting about how we became Mudders, and it all goes back to me and an email I wrote on April 30, 2010 to several good friends who were each experiencing some of life’s hardest and darkest times.  The email was a rallying cry, an effort to inspire my friends to join me in showing life that we were not going to take its worst days without showing it how we live our best days.

As I sit here, sore as hell and chuckling about our adventure on the course yesterday (yet also feeling a bit of the post Mudder blues), I realized that my next organized event is not a run, but a much needed nudge to honor my writing and creativity, Camp Mighty.  I am seriously WAY MORE terrified of that than any eight foot Berlin Wall will ever be.  But, since I used my writing to inspire the friends that have now helped me complete three Tough Mudders, I wanted to share that email, and a picture of me, with my actual face showing, however covered in glorious mud.

Hope this inspires you too.  I imagine it can.

30 April 2010

So there I was last night, on my walk with the pooches, not really running this week as my body needed the rest after the half on Sunday, and my mind started doing its thing where it lets go and settles into my “write” brain.  My feet would not not run, so I let myself settle into short bursts of jogging as gentle as possible since my feet still ache from the race, I had not taken my inhaler, and most of all, was without proper boob support.  I started thinking about the next physical challenge I wanted to pose for myself since that seems to be the way I have kept sane the past two years.  The ideas and images of half marathons and trying out Cross Fit and getting back to yoga all meandered by.  Then I remembered an article I read in the NY Times the night before about a challenge called Tough Mudder.

Apparently the Tough Mudder is a not-race, meaning it is untimed, but it is a 7 mile course with intensely crazy-fun obstacles, like a mud run on steroids.  I f’ing love it.

Now comes the imagining part…

As I walked along last night, I started going all GI Jane and thinking about climbing hills, and rope walls, and slogging through mud and doing it with glee and shouts and laughs and yawps and promise of beer at the end.  And then I thought, who would be the best people to have on a team for this insanity?  Please see list above :-)

Each one of us, for all our blessings has had their share of shitstorms, stresses, dramas, depressions, worries, and hells on Earth the past year or so.  Between us I tallied up three divorces, one nearing divorce, two strained marriages, two kids with life threatening surgeries, two pending bankruptcies, one mom on chemo and radiation, one dad in a coma, two sick dogs, two dogs who passed away, cats given up to others, family members dying, friends dying… just amongst the 10 of us.  Each one of us has found strength in the others and damn it all to hell, our tough asses are still here facing these seeming disasters.  And each one of us has used physical strength, movement and activity to heal ourselves, or at the very least, expend some of the nervous energy that builds up in our battered hearts and minds.  We have a triathlete, two marathoners, several collegiate athletes, skiers, both amateur and pro, and some who just like to run and all who like to move their bodies.

I started to imagine each of us, standing together as a team at the top of some crazy-ass hill in the Northern California mountains in October getting ready to hurl ourselves down it Braveheart-style, scramble across logs and rocks and mud and water all the while helping each other along the course.  We would be our own Race for the Cure: the Cure for Fear, the Cure for Worry, the Cure for Stress, the Cure for Hating Your Job, the Cure for Anger, the Cure for Sadness, the Cure for Others Who Cannot Hurl Themselves Down a Hill…  Us.  We together could do that.

And I would write about it.  Oh boy would I.

So, dear friends, I just ask you to IMAGINE.  Just spend a little time this weekend imagining this.  It is five months away and the same weekend as the Nike Half and Full, which two of you I know were considering anyway.  We would be an AWESOME team.  We already have a coach on the list.  And I am really good with logistics.

IMAGINE.

Love you,
J.

Tags: , ,

TM Recapper: How Awesome???

17 Oct

How much fun was the Tough Mudder?!

Think of your funnest day ever, then put it at 8,000 feet above sea-level  and spray water cannons at it and make it a bluebird day and have about 3,000 athletic, ridiculously good-looking be-costumed guys and gals (and if you’re a gal, there’s way more guys, so BONUS FUN!) and add free beer too, and a lot of purchased beer later, and you have yourself a Top Ten Funnest Weekend of All Time.  Oh my holy stars did we have a blast!  (Except for one rolled ankle, the loss of three of everything – clothes, shoes, gloves, socks, and uniform shirts – and almost hitting a deer on the drive up.  But the generous amount of fun and constant laughter kept our attitudes soaring above pain or fear and hatred of thieves and/or over-zealous janitors.)

In the spring I proposed this crazy idea to a group of good friends, all of whom had had particularly rough patches ranging from financial insolvency to break-ups to life threatening illnesses in parents and scariest of all, kids.  The group that came together was smaller than we started with, but all were there in spirit, the four standing Mud Hunnies carrying the challenge for the rest.  This was one of those experiences where my intentions for the event and the outcome I envisioned were in perfect synchronicity.  I marveled at the absence of struggle over the logistical minutiae: food was bought, recipes planned, shirts designed and decorated, housing secured, the bigger car was available.  It all just fell into place!

Mud Hunnies 2010

So off we went to Bear Valley, the Land That Time Forgot, or perhaps, just the inspiration for the ski village in “Hot Tub Time Machine.”  To get to Bear Valley, we had to travel through Copperopolis (“I passed through the seven levels of the Candy Cane forest, through the sea of swirly twirly gum drops, and then I walked through the Lincoln Tunnel…”).  Yes, it is a real place, but seems like it might be inhabited by pod people who sell ice cream cones, lottery tickets, and expound on the copper mining history of their “town.”  We left peel-out marks for fear they’d start eating our brains, or worse, our totally rock-solid quads which we really needed for all the climbing in store.

The event itself was, in a word, hellacool.  (With the exception of Lost & Found, it was also very well organized: I asked a Forest Ranger what he thought and he said that in 30 years with the Forest Service he had never seen such a well-run event.  You go Tough Mudder!)  Once we got signed in and took turns writing our bib numbers on our foreheads in permanent black marker (we are so badass), we headed to the start area with our wave.  They spaced out the waves by 15 minute increments so that there would be less chance of back-ups at the obstacle stations.  After some opening ceremonies with the national anthem (yes, I CRIED), the Tough Mudder Pledge, some bagpipes (yes, I CRIED, those fuckers should be illegal, there is a direct line from the pipes’ wail to my tear ducts), handshakes and hugs, and lots of pump-you-up shouting, we were off!

Hike: Ascent 2 of 3

From then on, we were confronted with hills up and hills down, mostly very steep, and every ½ mile or so, another obstacle.  They ranged from belly crawling under wires to high-knees through tires, to climbing over giant charley-horses with the help of your team and others, to schelping a large piece of wood along a path, to being submerged in FAH-reezing cold water TWICE.  And some other muddy stuff too.  The hikes were the physically hardest of the course for sure.  My teammates all said afterwards, with full bellies and beers in hand, that the course was not nearly as challenging as they had expected.  I on the other hand kept having that perfection of synchronicity between intention, expectation and outcome.  The course was just as hard as I needed it to be and as fun if not funner (!) than I imagined.  And I imagined some seriously good fun!  We decided it was a most excellent social event and that we are coming back for more next year.

We were THE VERY LAST CAR to leave the parking lot that afternoon.  (Until we were the last to leave the bar back at the condo village that night.)

We are SO awesome.

Tags:

Day 1: Bring Me The Discomfort

8 Oct

Yesterday was one of those shiny perfect San Francisco days:  bright autumn light, Giants in the playoffs and the Blue Angels roaring around the city for Fleet Week.  When I left the office, which lucky for me is right next door to the ballpark, orange and black clad baseball fans were filling the streets and the completely bitchen jets were flying loud and low over all of our upturned eyes.  When I got close to Embarcadero Center I smiled huge to see that they were flying a Giants flag at the very tippy-top!  And I don’t give a hoot about baseball!  I sent off a txt to several SF friends declaring my joy because it was too good not to share.

 

Teamwork.

 

Today is equally beautiful, and the Giants won last night.  Oh, and there were scores of men in uniform all along the Marina Green this morning and I was lucky I didn’t crash my car with all my gawking.  I am very predictable when it comes to congregations of hot military dudes, what with all my wide-eyed smiling and giggling.  They are just there doing their job, setting up for the air shows and flotilla watching, and I am having soldier flirting fantasies like I am a WWII nurse doing rounds on the base.

That pause only lasted so long, and then I realized, holy omg, tomorrow, for real, in real mud, elevation, weather, water hazards, walls, and yes…  fire, I will be the knee-deep in extreme discomfort as  the Mud Hunnies and I take on the course at the NorCal Tough Mudder in Bear Valley.  I am very excited and just like soaking up the good vibes of the gorgeousness of yesterday, I think this whole event will be a triumph because everyone is there to challenge some part of themselves so that they might overcome something else that has been going unfixed in the daily slog of life.  When I proposed this challenge to my friends I specifically pointed out that each one of us had already conquered some pretty harrowing circumstances and were in the midst of overcoming several more.  Each of us used sports and nature to provide a space for us to hear the answers we knew were inside of us, and then build the strength (physically and emotionally) to confront the obstacles, solve the problems, heal the pain, and find our laughter again.  I expect to be laughing a LOT tomorrow.

In a quiet moment this morning, pre-soldier leering, I picked some Angel Cards.  As usual (!), they were perfect for a little meditation on the Mudder and life, but my brain is pretty full to hit the whole “life” today at least.  I am positive I will work it out with my team tomorrow. Wooooo hoooooooooo!!!!

 

The Purpose Angel is climbing a mountain. She is a Mud Hunnie too.

 

Tags:

Days 12 and 11: My First Yawp

27 Sep

Saturday  night I had the honor of sharing some of my writing with an audience.  I was invited to do this by one of my closest friends who is a painter and her cousin who is a singer, songwriter and very gifted musician.  Like all things in life that once seemed an endless and totally out of reach struggle, the moment I was standing there reading my essay, it all made perfect, effortless sense.  In reporting back to a friend this morning about how it went I said, “I felt alive.”  She smiled with a deep understanding.  Yep, I’m hooked.

The event was billed as MUSIC + ART, her paintings actually directly inspired by his music and lyrics, so I decided to spend some time this past week sort of ruminating about what music and art mean in my life.  I did this on my runs, and also talked about it with a few select friends.  I could not have picked a more immense, complex, or subjective topic on which to offer an opinion and share a few anecdotes.  I thought a lot about the true artists, writers, actors, singers, dancers and musicians I know who are out there everyday creating and making a living at it only because they know they must.  I only just recently allowed myself to start creating in public, but like I said, there is an ease now, and so I know it is right.

The thing I like about blog writing is that the medium fits my extremely lazy side; although I value citations and support, man I hate spending more time looking for the quote than actually just writing about my feelings and observations.  I decided to frame the essay around the denotative meaning of art and share some of my stories about how it makes me feel.

I also remembered this great scene in “Dead Poet’s Society” when Todd Anderson finds his yawp.  I totally found mine.  Essay follows after the clip and when we have the video of me reading from the event, I’ll share that too.  Enjoy!  YAAAAWWWWWPPPP!!

When I think about something as vast both in concept and tangibility as art, sometimes it is just easier for me to start with the good ol’ dictionary. Or let’s be honest, good ol’ dictionary.com. I have been thinking about what art is, knowing that this topic is perhaps one of the most subjective and basically infinite of the human experience. Or at least the humans that I know.

“Art” has 16 entries in its primary definition on dictionary.com. From where my train of thought is headed, this one has the most direct route:

“the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.”

But for a little detour, I like this too:

“skilled workmanship, execution, or agency, as distinguished from nature. “

I like that nature got a mention, because there is no greater artist than the one we call Mother Nature. I had an Outward Bound instructor remind me that every single answer is there for us in nature, you just have to slow down and look for it. That always calms me right down. Try it sometime: concentrate on a leaf and you will solve many personal crises.

Earlier this summer I was in Washington DC with a group of high school and college kids lobbying on Capitol Hill. After a long slog through our day of meetings, we loaded up on donated Olive Garden pasta and headed out to see the monuments at night. We were very lucky to have with us the writer of the bill we were supporting, and who just so happens to be a history professor. He was our personal docent for each of the monuments we visited.

DC in July is beyond hot. It is muggy, sticky, drippy and uncomfortable, even at night. But the foul weather does not hinder the crowds who come to the capitol to see the monuments and memorials in the least. As we walked along Chris was giving us background and facts on how the Mall was designed, the politics behind each decision to build what monument where. We came upon the VietNam War Memorial, Maya Lin’s wall of names of each of the soldiers who died in the war. At night The Wall is barely illuminated, but lights from mobile phones and flashlights bounce around like electronic fireflies not to mention the quaint flicker of lighters and candles. People still look for the names of their loved ones in the darkness, often with a piece of paper and pencil to rub a relief of the name so that they may take it along with them. I lost my group for several minutes as I paused to look up the name of my friend’s father in the directory. I got the chills when I turned exactly to his page.

After a deep breath, and a literal “shake it off” I headed up to the Lincoln Memorial, which was teeming with people, echoes and flashbulbs. As I ascended the steps, after having just barely had enough time to process The Wall, I could feel the sting in my eyes. I saw my group, walked over to Chris, and choked out, “I’m just so emotional.” He looked me in the eye and said, “It’s an emotional place.” The sound kind of dropped out for me and I stood there taking in the impressive scale of the Lincoln statue, and then turned to see the words on the walls: his second inaugural speech, and the Gettysburg Address. At that point, I let the tears go.

Once more, we had to press on, this time to the Korean War Memorial. And that is when it hit me. What were we all doing here together, even if unknown to each other? What brought us all here to this night in July in terribly uncomfortable heat all at the same time, a scene which is repeated nearly every night of every year, year in and year out?

Art.

Art brought us all together. Monuments “of more than ordinary significance” built by artists to honor our loved ones, our soldiers, our civilians, our values, our ideals, our history, our pride, our pain, our humanity. What is the only thing that can heal the gaping wounds of slavery, war, genocide, and just plain bad human behavior? Art. Art is the only thing to heal us. Art did this that night in July and art does this every single day of every one of our lives.

I started to think about why art does this and I could only muster a very simplistic answer. I will leave it to the critics and professors and people way smarter and more patient than I am to expound more technically and philosophically on why, but here’s my take. Art and music and film and books and plays and any creative expression of human emotion whether a finger painting by a toddler or a joke rant by Chris Rock or a Shakespearean tragedy or even the real Mona Lisa behind all that bulletproof glass, connects us all to our shared humanity and to that mostly unexplainable tingling in our chest. What I might not be able to express in any articulate, linear, equation, some talented human being has done for me, and then I know I am A) not crazy with all these tears and spontaneous feelings of joy and B) very much alive.

I can barely get through one of Chopin’s polonaises which might happen to be on the radio, in my car, during my mundane errand run without blinking back tears, and if I happen to be at a live symphony or ballet, FORGET IT, the second those bows hit the strings I am covered in goosebumps and better have remembered to wear waterproof mascara. This also happens to me with certain Walt Whitman poems and I am pretty sure the first time I heard Duran Duran at age 12 on my lunchbox-sized Walkman with the synthesizers seemingly passing from my left ear to the right THROUGH MY SKULL, I was having what many apparently call a religious experience. The emotion that art evokes is not limited to weeping; it is also gut melting laughter and fist pumping rock and roll joy and magical inspiration and calm, reflective, confident understanding.

I would add a seventeenth entry to the definition of art:

Gracious, tireless, judgment-free host of opportunities for humans to be wiser, kinder, funnier, gentler goofier, and better at treating each other and the world around them.

Tags:

Day 14: Daft Punk, deadmau5, Depeche Mode, DOOBIES…

24 Sep

Something that always makes me giggle about Los Angeles, are the endless streams of people not at work in the middle of the day.  (Lawyers, agents and studio execs are exempt from this however, since all they do is work, and go to many lunches.  You only see them on weekends at yoga.)  This is mainly attributed to the legions who are actors, writers, directors, producers, and the unemployed production professionals between shows who may be on the streets, but are completely stressed about where/when/how the next job is going to materialize.  Then there are those who are out an about who are working, but are in the employ of someone with a perception that they have less time than the rest of us, but in reality just have more money and can therefore hire out for minding, errands and dogwalking.  What is really funny though is that all of these people never really seems like they are trying to find a job or even working, rather they all seem to be working out at Runyon Canyon.  I feel that I have credibility on this topic as I have been one of the LA unemployeds tromping up down Runyon with wannabe starlets, pasty-looking writers, and all manner of canines.  And most every time I am in town, I head over for a dose of Runyon-life.

It was about 400 degrees by 9AM, but the parking opens up right then, so I was glad I waited.  Not only do I get a kick out of the street-theatre of Runyon, but there is a really excellent steep face that I needed for some serious uphills.  I hit the trail with a good steady march, and got to the bottom of the climb in only about five minutes.  I realized just how much I was sweating and that it was time to shed a layer, something I often don’t get to do at home, but was going to fit right in being half naked in the land of obsessively perfect <ahem, too skinny> bodies.  Even just in a sports bra and shorts I was more covered than some of the ladies.  But what the hell, it was hot.

At the top of the climb, I took a quick break, went back down the same way, and then back up as fast as I could.  This is when the music choice became critical and the only thing that would work was something synthesizery.  Those types of songs make me feel like a robot machine that will plow down anything it its path as opposed to a flesh and blood asthma sufferer, wheezing her way up the hill.  I got some Daft Punk to shove my ass to the top and catch my breath, then deadmau5 started thumping away for a super-fast take off down the hill.  I love a downhill run. I jammed past all sorts of trudging unemployeds, hipsters dressed inappropriately for the weather and venue, and the young starlets wearing extensions that probably cost more than two months rent.  Depeche Mode helped me weave around cute groups of moms and babies and dogs, all of us exchanging smiles as I went on by.

As I neared the bottom of the hill, feeling quite energized by this workout, the Doobies came on for a cool down.  I thought about just how long LA has been part of my life, but also how just plain weird of a place it always seems.  As “Minute By Minute” played in my ears, I thought about coming here every year as a kid, head exploding every time I saw a limo or a movie star or the Beverly Center.  I have been lucky to see LA over several decades and lived here for 11 years as an adult, and while it is a place built on having the newest new all the time, I don’t miss the feeling that I have to keep up with that anymore.

I will keep coming to Runyon though.

Tags: , , ,

Day 15: LA Woman

23 Sep

I always like an 11:11.

I’m on the road for a few days, down in LA to participate in my first ever art and music event, where I will be reading one of my very own essays from this blog to actual people.  Out loud.  In public.  A microphone will be involved.  You know, the kind that amplifies your voice.  I’d actually like to scream into it first to get out the nerves.

Happily, I am staying with a very close friend, she herself a successful actress, who could not be more supportive or more fun and interesting to talk to about all things art, intellectual, introspection, emotion, and is also very, very funny.  One of her best friends is also staying here, he himself an actor, writer and director, and just about to present his latest work, a documentary film, at an event on Saturday night in Santa Barbara.

(Dear Universe, Thank you for making sure I was in such a nurturing place all weekend surrounded by encouragement near and far.  You sure know what you’re doing Universe, funny how that is!  I promise to keep listening to you, I know I know, I can be stubborn and rebellious, but you’re always right.  Love you, mean it.)

Since I am also having to stay on track with Tough Mudder training, I arrived just  in time to join my hostess for a hike.  Weirdly enough, although very LA to say this especially after having lived there for 11 years, I had never ever been on those trails, basically up above the Griffith Observatory.  We hiked at the pace of chat, but we always get so many topics going at once we  definitely got our brain and heart rates up.  We covered a lot: family and friend updates, asthma medication, work, dating, skin care, what is art, nutrition tidbits, taking in the view and a chat with an LA city worker.  That’s why I love a good hike; you never know what the topic will be around the next bend.

We got home, rounded up some groceries and Thai take-out, had a delicious meal all together, and then we each hit the sack before 10PM.  Nothing better than feeling content at the end of  a very lovely day.

Sleeping with my smile on.

Tags:

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 151 other followers

%d bloggers like this: