The Can’t-Miss Bookshelf

A few months back, Shawna and I bought a cabin in the woods. It looks like this:

It’s surrounded by six acres of maple, birch, beech and pine trees. Not to mention, zillions of birds.

When we took possession, our biggest decision wasn’t about what furniture or kitchenware to buy. It was about books. Specifically – what books should go north, and which belonged at home?

It was a grueling decision. How can you separate your babies? In the end we decided to bring a smallish collection of books to the cabin (i.e. 300 or so), but every single book needed to be a can’t-miss book.

It’s a cabin, after all. Which means we’ll have lots visitors. And what do visitors want when they stretch out in the hammock? A can’t-miss book.

These aren’t all highbrow books, by any means. You’ll find volumes by Steig Larrson and Paullina Simons tucked alongside the Richard Fords and Joan Didions. But you’ll also find some surprises: Tennessee Williams’ short stories, Michael Chabon’s “Kavalier and Clay,” and the stunning “Special Topics in Calamity Physics.”

I defy you to sit down with any of those books and not get sucked in like a dust-bunny into a Dyson.

NOTE: I plan to add Barbara Kingsolver’s “Poisonwood Bible” to the shelf, along with Wallace Stegner’s “Crossing to Safety,” and Haruki Murikami’s “The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.”

Right in the middle, there’s our “powerful female memoir” section. These are some of my favourite books. But we’re always looking for more – any suggestions? Jeanette Walls’ “The Glass Castle” is a must-have, but what else?

Hating on Running

Shalane Flanagan is this crazyfast American distance runner. She ran the marathon at the 2012 London Olympics, finishing in 10th place, with a time of 2:25.

In other words, she can run 26 miles in less time than it takes you to watch Wreck it Ralph.

In order to run that fast, Shalane has to train A LOT. Running is her full time job. And like all full-time jobs, it sometimes drives her a little bit crazy CRAZY.

It’s a good list. But she left out my biggest complaint. Sometimes, when you wear tear-away pants on a run, you can accidentally snag them on the front bumper of a car stopped at an intersection, and find yourself pants-less in downtown Toronto…

Your Running Playlist

It’s more mellow than the disco dance floor bangers of her last CD, “Hands.” And at only 125 beats per minute, this one’s more suited to a leisurely jog than a race-pace workout. Still, it’s a great melody, and just wait until it kicks into high gear at the 3:41 mark.

You can grab the track for free at the Little Boots website.

Real Life Superheroes, Part 3

Heroes are everywhere – in comic books, movies, and of course MY UPCOMING NOVEL! But real-life superheroes pop up in some pretty surprising places. Like the running track, or even the basketball court.

Check out this video that’s been making the rounds:

So often these days, sports stories have to do with money, or winning-at-all-costs, or banned substances (yeah, I’m looking at YOU, Lance Armstrong).

But that’s not the whole story. Here’s an entire football team of real-life superheroes:

It doesn’t take much to be heroic. You don’t need X-ray vision, or six-pack abs. All you need is a little kindness.

Hot Crossed Buns + Parents = Speed!

Peterborough half-marathon

“Did you know that you can only buy hot crossed buns during Lent?” Dad asked me.

I shook my head, no.

“It’s true,” he said. “That’s why the cross is there. It’s an ancient tradition.”

I asked Mom and Dad what they’re giving up for Lent. “Nothing,” said Dad. “Nothing,” said Mom. We all laughed. When I was a kid, giving up something for Lent around our house was…well, it was gospel.

“Nowadays the focus isn’t so much on what you give up,” said Dad, “but on what you take on. What you do to lighten your neighbour’s load.”

I”d taken a bus to Peterborough for the annual half-marathon. My parents live a couple of miles from the starting line, so I was staying with them. Dad was in a hurry, getting ready for church. He was on Sidesperson’s duty, which meant he had to put on a tie and a sports-jacket, and get to church early to greet the parishoners, and help them into their pews. Mom was also on Sidesperson duty, but she played hooky to drive me to the starting line.

“I can always take a cab,” I told her.

“No,” she grinned. “I’m glad for the excuse.”

The roads were dry, and it was one degree above zero, which meant I didn’t need to wear long underwear. Mom dropped me at the YMCA, where I picked up my racing bib and traded stories with the other runners. At noon I went outside and bounced around in the starting corral, trying to stay warm. I thought to myself: I LOVE THIS! I LOVE RUNNING! THIS IS WHAT I LIVE FOR!

45 minutes later, I was no longer happy. I was unhappy. Ultra unhappy.

I’d run 12 kilometers, and my lungs were on fire. It took all my strength to keep from throwing myself into a snowbank and bursting into tears.

I HATE RUNNING, I thought! THIS SPORT SUCKS! WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF?

In that moment I hated absolutely everyone and everything in the world.

The volunteer handing me a cup of Gatorade? HATED HER!

The barefoot runner dude? HATED HIM!

The kindly-looking folks at the side of the road? HATED THEM TOO.

“You can do it!” they shouted.

I nearly yelled right back at them: “YOU’RE WRONG! I CAN’T DO IT! YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH THIS HURTS! GET OUT HERE AND START RUNNING IF YOU THINK IT’S SO EASY!”

Suddenly I realized who they were. Broke into a grin and stretched my arms wide:

I was SO happy to see my parents, I did a little tap-dance there on the road. Mom and Dad had been standing outside in the freezing cold for an hour, just so they could cheer me on.

“Nowadays the focus isn’t so much on what you give up,” Dad had said earlier, “but on what you take on. What you do to lighten your neighbour’s load.”

In a flash, I thought about all the stuff my parents had done for me over the years. All the diapers they’d changed. All the meals they’d cooked. That time Dad picked me up at the Pen Centre after I crashed his van. The time Mom nursed me through a 105 degree fever.

They’d done so much to lighten my load. And what did I do for them in return?

I tossed them my sweaty neck-warmer.

“What the heck is that?” Dad shouted after me.

“It’s his underwear!” another runner joked.

And then a strange thing happened. As I ran away from my parents, I noticed that my pain was gone. I sped up and got back into the zone, and finished 2 seconds faster than my goal. (1:29:58)

It’s a good reminder. Next time you’re having a rough time on the road, stop dwelling on your own pain, and shift your thoughts to someone else. Think about what you can do to lighten their load.

And while you’re at it, eat some hot crossed buns too.

Re-Writing is Your Friend

People often ask me how many times I re-wrote my first novel. Trust me when I say, YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW.

I wrote the first version in the summer of 2008. It was 20,000 words long, and it swallowed two months of my life.

I finished the second draft a month later. By Christmas I’d rewritten it a third time, and then I sent it out.

I sent it to an agent and also a publisher. The publisher said some nice things about it. She said the narration was lovely and warm; perhaps too lovely and warm. She explained that the warm tone made it hard to believe that the central character was living on top of a calamity. Which was why she was going to take a pass.

The agent didn’t bother to reply.

I wasn’t dejected. I’ve written lots of stuff over the years that never got published. That’s the writer’s life. I stuffed the manuscript in a drawer and forgot about it.

Two years later, I picked it up again. I re-wrote it for…let’s see…the fourth time.

After 5 months of work, I pitched it 50 agents. 49 of them said, “Thanks but no thanks.”

The fiftieth agent (the brilliant Scott Waxman who represents some of the finest sports writers, including the legendary John L. Parker) called me on the phone. When I saw the 212 area code on the display, I knew something was up. Scott told me that he liked my story; that he’d read it to his kids and they liked it too. He said, however, that he wasn’t quite ready to offer representation just yet. There were a few things I ought to think about – if, that is, I was “willing to re-write the manuscript.”

I thought about the improvements that Scott suggested. I thought about them for all of ten seconds.

Once again, I started re-writing. When I finished that re-write I did another.

And then another.

After six months of re-writing, Scott Waxman accepted my novel. I received an “Offer to Represent” in the mail.

Cue the champagne corks! Cue the s’mores!

A couple of months later, the novel sold to Scholastic Canada.

MORE champagne! MORE s’mores!

IN the year or so since I signed with Scholastic, I’ve done three more rewrites. The first took 3 months, the second took one month, the third took a week.

That makes eleven re-writes in all.

I know that sounds like a lot of work, but listen: with every single re-write the book got better!

Lesson learned:

Writing a book, and running 100 miles, are similar in two distinct ways.

(1) Both involve a TON of pain.

and (2) The finish line is incredibly sweet.

Ups and Downs

Want to have some fun?

Try running up a mountain, like this:

That’s the Canigou, a 2,700 metre (9000 foot) monster in the south of France.

Here I am, standing at the peak:

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking I look old and tired.

DARNED RIGHT I LOOK OLD AND TIRED! I JUST RAN UP A 9000 FOOT MOUNTAIN!

It took me five hours to scratch my way to the summit. Hurricane force winds were pounding the peak, and I nearly got blown off. Also, my brain felt like tapioca since (oops!) I forgot to eat enough food on the way up. Luckily I’d brought along a loaf of bread in my Dora the Explorer knapsack, and also a bar of nougat, which is this delicious candy made out of pistachio nuts and marshmallows. I hoovered the whole bar (which was at least a foot long), and the entire baguette, and suddenly I felt massively:

POWERFUL!

INVINCIBLE!

INVULNERABLE!

Climbing up a mountain is optional. But once you’re up there in the sky, with those hurricane-force winds bashing in your brains, and the occasional blizzard in July, well coming back down is MANDATORY.

I heard this statistic once: ninety percent of all mountain-climbing accidents happen when the climbers are on their way down. That’s because the climbers are totally spent from climbing up, and they get more careless on the descent.

Did this worry me?

Naaaaaaah! Why? Because I was:

POWERFUL!

INVINCIBLE!

INVULNERABLE!

I pointed myself down that vertical trail and I SPRINTED!

Trees flashed past. Mountain streams evaporated in my wake. I ricocheted down those switchbacks.

Did I say that my favourite thing in the world is running up mountains? Scratch that. Running DOWN mountains is my favourite thing.

What took five hours to go up, took ninety minutes to come down. I was reminded of Japhy Ryder, the crazy protagonist in Jack Kerouac’s novel, The Dharma Bums, who tap-danced down a mountain in California-

“…in huge twenty foot leaps. Running, leaping, landing with a great drive of his booted heels, bouncing five feet or so, running, then taking another long crazy yelling yodelling sail down the sides of the world.”

And in that flash I realized that it is impossible to fall off mountains, just as the main character in that book realized, and I soared down the mountain with those same fantastic and fearless and foolish runs and jumps.

In what seemed like ten minutes, I was back at the foot of the mountain. My feet were blistered, not only on the bottom but the sides as well. I had to stop running for four days. But it was worth it.

Katy Perry Saved My Life

Running can be fun.

Except when it’s not:

This is a picture of the Peterborough half-marathon, back in 2012. I’m the sixth guy in line, the one wearing the blue jacket and black cap. It’s February, which accounts for the crap weather. I’d just passed the 17 kilometer mark, which meant I had 4 more kilometers left to run.

I was hurting. Close to throwing up. But five minutes after this picture was taken, everything changed. Why? Because I put on my headphones and fired up my tunes.

I don’t usually listen to music when I’m racing. I prefer the sound of hundreds of sneakers slapping the pavement on those lonely stretches of road. Also, I once made the mistake of adding an Ed Sheeran track to one of my marathon playlists. I love that guy, but for some reason, his song was way too gloomy for mile 23. I nearly threw myself into a ditch curb and wept.

This time around, I got lucky. Katy Perry came on first thing. The song “Last Friday Night” is cheesy and happy – exactly what I needed just then.

So Katy Perry was playing, and I was on the verge of throwing up. And then, well, this will sound weird… But part of my brain crawled right into the ribcage of that song, and it felt like the guitar licks were shooting out through my forehead. The bass line invaded my legs and made me run faster. I ran past a shop window and caught my reflection. My face looked long and pasty like a Scream horror movie mask. I felt myself rising into the air, and suddenly I was looking down at my body from twenty feet up.

This is what you call a hallucination. In running circles, they call this “the bonk.” It happens when your brain runs out of sugar.

Happily, I only had 4 kilometers left to run. Plus, my tank was full of Katy Perry.

I pulled my brain back down into my body. Not far ahead, I saw a guy in a red jacket. I told my legs to run faster. “RUN FASTER!” I told them. My legs obeyed and a couple of minutes later, I found myself passing the dude in the red jacket. I zeroed in on another runner. When I passed her, I targeted another. And then another.

That’s how Katy Perry saved my life. Her new album is supposed to drop this summer and I CAN’T WAIT!

SOOOO – what are YOUR favourite running / racing songs? What tunes have helped You finish strong?

Runner Meet Bear

Spend enough time running through the forest and eventually you’ll have a moment like this:

(WARNING: profanity alert!)

I’ve run into a bunch of bears while out running. And while I probably reacted like the guy in the video, it’s important to remember that most bears are total scaredy cats. (Of course, I live in Ontario, Canada, where we have Black Bears, not Grizzlies.)

What I’ve learned: when running through the forest, you should make as much noise as possible. Wear bells or a whistle, make noise, and the bears will probably keep out of your way.

Me, I keep up a steady chatter. Being a radio guy, I usually do the audio technician talk: “CHECK ONE TWO THREE! ONE TWO ONE TWO! SIBILENCE! SIBILENCE! HEY CHECK ONE TWO THREE!”

Sometimes I sing. Jay-Z, Muse, Lady Gaga, it’s all good.

In spite of my awful singing voice I sometimes still run into bears in the woods. One time I rounded a bend in the trail, and came across a little bear cub, chowing down on a patch of raspberries bushes. I was running pretty fast, and neither the bear nor I noticed each other until I was ten feet away. The bear looked up, spun around, and darted up the hill and into the forest, CHUFF-CHUFF-CHUFFING as he went. The whole encounter lasted maybe 3 seconds. My heart hammered for a few minutes after that, and I probably swore like the guy in the video. But in the end, everything happened just the way it was supposed to, i.e. THE BEAR RAN AWAY!

Still – if you’re running in the forest, it’s best to do so with a partner. And be sure to tell someone where you’re going. And carry a phone if at all possible!

Real Life Superheroes, Part 2

Take a look at the runners in these pictures. Can you tell what makes them all special?

First, there’s America’s Dick Beardsley (on the left):

Up next, Spain’s Fernandez Anaya (in green):

And finally, Ohio track star Meghan Vogel (blonde hair, on the right):

Any guesses? Yes, they’re all runners, and yes, they’re crazy fit. They probably run 100+ miles a week and eat nothing but salads and nuts. But these incredibly healthy human specimens have something much more interesting – and much more valuable – in common.

You’ve got fifteen seconds to figure it out. Tick tick tick tick tick…TIME’S UP!

ANSWER: All of these runners are real-life superheroes. They’re not only fast. They’re also super kind.

Take Meghan Vogel. She was competing in her third race of the day. Ahead of her, a runner crumpled to the ground in the heat. But instead of dashing past her, she lifted her up, helped her to the finish line, and literally pushed her across the finish line.

Fernandez Anaya (the guy in the green shirt) was equally generous. He was running second in his race, a ways behind the race leader, Abel Mutai. As he entered the finishing straight, Fernandez noticed Mutai pull up about 10 metres before the finish line. Mutai thought he’d crossed the finish line, BUT HE HADN’T! He still had 30 feet left to go!

Instead of racing past Mutai for the win, Fernandez slowed down and gestured at him to keep running. He literally helped the OTHER guy win.

Which brings me to the black and white photo of Dick Beardsley at the top. Dick was running the very first London marathon in 1981. He and Norway’s Inge Simonsen spent the race battling for first place. In the finishing stretch, instead of trying to prove who was better than the other, the athletes clasped hands and crossed the finish line together.

How awesome is that? They acknowledged they were evenly matched, and split the first place prize two ways.

Someone should show these videos to Lance Armstrong.