The Write Journey

Agony and Thrills

I watched the Women's Olympic Marathon this morning, a grueling 26 mile race mostly uphill through beautiful countryside, ironically beginning in the town of Marathon, Greece, where the sport was invented. It's fascinating to watch the determination, the sheer strength of will it takes to put your body through that kind of ordeal.

Great Britain's Paula Radcliffe was the favorite, and started out very strong. She led or was just behind the leader for the first 18 miles or so, and seemed to set the pace at which the other 8-10 front runners seemed content to follow. But then Mizuki Noguchi of Japan, who had stayed pretty much on Radcliffe's heels most of the race, made a bold move. Within just a couple of minutes she had about a ten plus second lead on everyone else, and the leaders began to spread out as most of them fell far behind. From there on out, Noguchi kept up the pressure, and though Kenyan Catherine Ndereba hung fairly close and gave a vailiant effort near the end, Noguchi held on for a 12 second victory and captured the gold.

Meanwhile, two other stories went on behind the scenes, so to speak. Radcliffe, the favorite to win coming in, continued to fall back and eventually dropped out altogether at mile 22.5. Knowing how hard these atheletes train, and seeing that the majority of the spectators waiting at the finish line were her fellow countrymen who had such high hopes for her, it was really sad and almost painful to watch Radcliffe stop, try to stumble forward again a few steps, stop and start again, and then finally bend over in defeat. In the last shot we saw of her, she walked over to the curb, sat down, and cried. I can't even begin to imagine the sorrow, frustration, and personal humiliation she must have felt at not only failing to bring home an Olympic medal, but not even being able to finish at all.

And yet on the uplifting side, American Deena Kastor, who at one time was as much as two minutes and twenty seconds off the lead in 18th place, put on a furious charge the last six miles as the course turned downhill. She made up 15 spots and over a minute in time as she came from nowhere to pass Elfenesh Alemu within the last couple of miles to steal away the bronze medal from the Ethiopian.

I found myself wondering if I could ever have the level of dedication these women had to put forward in order to compete on such a high level, and frankly, I'm really not sure. Also I think it's kind of funny how, in this day of gimmick TV, where flash and shock seem to be the motive operendi for all forms of entertainment media, that watching the raw emotions of people giving their all for the thrill of competition, and often only reaping the agony of seeing your life-long dreams dashed, can still be so compelling.

Maybe we can learn more than a few things from these incredible athletes.

- The WheelMan

Humbling

It's truly humbling to look at the devastation left behind by Hurricane Charley in Florida. It just proves that no matter how advanced mankind becomes, there are still, and always will be I believe, forces or powers at work beyond our control.

My thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected, including one friend of mine who lost two family members in this tragedy.

- The WheelMan

The drought is OVER!!

One of the downsides of being a writer (perhaps THE only true downside), is that you get rejected. A lot. A WHOLE lot. It's such a subjective thing just getting accepted, like a contestant in a beauty contest, there may be an entire spectrum of reasons why your story wasn't accepted by a publication, often with none of them having a whit to do with your writing ability or the quality of your story. Sometimes I, like everyone else, begin to wonder after an extended period of no acceptances, whether I've truly got what it takes to be a successful writer. I always quickly shrug the sensation off, as every writer must if he or she is to have the patience and audacity to build a career, but still the feeling does manifest its ugly head at times.

Today, however, I just learned that AlienSkin Magazine has accepted a piece I sent to them last month. My flash fiction piece will appear in the September issue. As AlienSkin is a market I very much like and wanted to get into, this is such awesome news for me. I can't wait! I'm very honored to have been accepted by them, and I hope I'll be able to publish more with them in the future.

Stay tuned here, and I'll let you know when my story goes live.

- The WheelMan

"For the Love of Learning..."

Yes, I know the old O'Jays song actually says "For the Love of Money," but as I was thinking of a title for this post, that song came to mind. I LOVE learning, and I think I sometimes forget that until I watch a history or science program on TV, learn a new programming trick for the web, a new artistic technique in Photoshop, or read a book on any of the above topics or others.

I started reading Physicist Brian Greene's "The Fabric of the Cosmos" this week, and it's really excited me in a way I haven't experienced in a while. I won't do a review yet until I finish it, but suffice it to say, I'm slowly absording the concepts about the true nature and relationship of space and time, and I can almost "feel" my view of the universe expanding. I've already come up with ideas for a couple of stories, and I'm only about three chapters into the book. Actually grasping onto what the universe is believed to be comprised of and picturing it in my mind, is challenging to say the least (neither a physicist nor scientist am I), but it also opens up room for some possibilities that rival any wondrous adventure Captain Kirk and crew have ever been on. The sad thing is that there's so much for we humans to learn, and so little time (relatively speaking) for us to learn it.

Regardless of whether you are of a spiritual bent or not, I think we all have one basic nagging question churning in our gut: "Why are we here?" It's amazing to learn about the process of looking for that answer and hundreds more. The sad thing is that I, nor any of you, will probably live long enough to actually see the ffinal answers.

But then maybe God'll have the Cliff Notes version of "All The Universe's Secrets" waiting for ua on the other side. :)

- The WheelMan