Journal – Page 2

Waddayagonnado

August 23, 2012 By Michael Lebowitz 1 Comment

“There is nothing quite so gentle, deep, and irrational as our running—and nothing quite so savage, and so wild.” –Bernd Heinrich. It is no longer a matter of how fast or how far or how fast over how far for me. It used to be that way. It had to be that way. Now the “gentle deep and irrational” along with the “so savage and so wild” is mostly to be found in the writing, in the shooting, in getting to the high places, the hard places, the dark ledges on the trail and seeing “beyond the shadows”, in wrasslin’ to be free of yesterday and tomorrow… Hello Mr. Day, I’m comin’ for ya and I can tell you this, I need a goddam break from another day of shrug, what the hell, wadddayagonnado. You get my drift?

Hurrying Near

August 23, 2012 By Michael Lebowitz 1 Comment

Went to the track this morning. Did some quarter mile like repeat stuff. Felt old, tired, stiff, wore out and, finally, pretty good. Remembered that I was never a track star or even “real good”. I just showed up. A few weeks ago someone asked me how fast my quarters were that morning. I fudged an answer. It felt like a loaded question, full of challenge, too much like the old days of “let’s see who’s got what” bullshit. He is nearly 50 and puts in big miles and hard track workouts. I haven’t seen fifty in quite a while. And big miles/hard track workouts have become something that no longer mean what they used to mean. Simply put, time doesn’t stand still. Truth was, I hadn’t looked, I had been happy just to be there, to be able to do them at all. Me, the young fool, thought he was going to live forever, ride hard and die young. The old fool, me, knows better, is aware that “Time’s winged chariot” is “hurrying near” with each passing sunrise. I reckon a few very slow 400’s with Flash and Bigfoot and Merlin(they ran way faster) is a fine way to start the day and indeed, to keep on keepin’ on.

Good Animals

August 23, 2012 By Michael Lebowitz Leave a Comment

“There is no substitute for learning to live in our bodies. All the tests and all the machines in the world will fail if we do not first become good animals.” –George Sheehan said that. Light out, go over yonder, head down the road; I did it this morning, ran that is. A man of any gender isn’t his waistline, or his aerobic capacity but more so his dreams and his commitment to them, to his sweat and his perseverance in the real world, to his kindness and his regard for the necessity of truth and compassion and kindness when telling the truth…all this is much clearer to me in the miles, on account of ten miles is ten miles at 5 minutes per, ten minutes per 30 minutes per…you just need to get them, the miles that is, in order to have what they have to offer. The rest is just window dressing and disappears with the years.

Every Word

August 15, 2012 By Michael Lebowitz 1 Comment

“Every word was a lie” is what I wrote one day,

But then again, how would I know?

I believed every lie even when I knew it wasn’t true

because that’s what you do when she’s young and hard bodied

and your time and your dope is damn near gone.

Or at least that’s what I did.

I haven’t been to the “far back of the bar” for a very long time,

I don’t get misty eyed anymore

when I hear Johnny Hartman sing Lush Life.

The music is still sweet and sad.

Even now I want the blue smoke and murmur underneath

the worn out seduction that tonight will be different,

It was exciting wasn’t it,

even though we always knew how it would end.

Maybe she still has luminous red hair, or it could be

red streaked with grey. Maybe I’ll let go of the lies,

go outside and kick up a little dust,

dance alone under the stars of a North Texas summer night.

A Week In a Life

August 11, 2012 By Michael Lebowitz 1 Comment

Just watched a very smart show and had the thought that my life could have been/should have been filled with that kind of intelligence and adrenaline-excitement and I got very close to regret. Then it occurred to me that I couldn’t go back and change things but I could give the work I do every day the same kind of integrity, find that feeling there. So okay then, let’s get it on.

In Boise, Idaho. Heading to Boise National Forest in a couple of hours to shoot the Wild Idaho Fifty Mile Endurance Run(WIFMER). This event was the first true ultra I shot, a year ago this weekend; a lot has happened since, damn near all of it well beyond anything I might have imagined and damn near all of it very, very, good. I will see the usual suspects, meet some new ones, sleep little, work lots and maybe get some photo images that enhance but will never replace the effort and the memory of what these folks, what ultra folks everywhere, do when they set out on the single track, light out down the road, go over yonder, all of it just because. I have been given a great gift in this, my second chance, and I intend to honor it with my presence and hard work, with a little bit of prayer and a whole mess of good luck, the forces willin’ and the crick don’t rise.

People who are my age often say “things were simpler then” and I think that it is a crock but then I heard this on the radio” Hey, bad news, be no rockin’ tonight/hey bad news be no rockin’ tonight, baby’s gone, ain’t nowhere in sight.” Okay then, simpler and when I first heard that I had no idea that rockin’ meant what rockin’ meant in the way that Rockin’ meant it, although the parents of my generation who said it was all about sex and shit, they were right about thinking it was pretty simple and outright scary. Me, I thought it sounded great and you sure could dance to it.

Gonna go to Mt Hood today to shoot a 50 mile race tomorrow. Gonna see a lot of people I know, meet some new ones. Gonna drive home late, sleep some and shoot another mountain run on Sunday morning at Hardesty; gonna see a bunch of people I know. Meet some new ones. Thursday I’m gonna go to Idaho, to the Boise National Forest and shoot a 50 miler and see a bunch of people I know, meet some new ones: all these people I know love what they do and where they do it. I sometimes think I am pretty damned lucky to be allowed to participate in my own little way. Correction: I think that every freakin’ day. Rock on, y’all, the best is yet to come.

“It’s one of those things that I just got lucky, and I didn’t screw up. It’s about being lucky and not screwing up, and trying to be ready for some moment if you happen to be the right place.” David Burnett, photographer on a famous Olympic image (Mary Decker in ’84) I ain’t him, and what I shoot isn’t Olympic in stature but it’s damned hard for the athletes and not easy on me so when it works, and it sometimes does, I think, wow, I got it, well, really, I didn’t screw it up. Nice to know I’m not alone with that.