S. Kay Murphy's Blog, page 32

Cycle. Sprint. Repeat.

I'm not one to say "I told you so," so I won't.  But...

Peter Sagan has gone on to win the 3rd and 4th stages of the Amgen Tour of California, in addition to his wins in the first two stages.  Impressive.  But...  You have to understand how professional cycling works, if you're new to this game.  It's not like all 140 guys roll out in the morning and the first one across the line 120 miles later is the winner.  Well, I mean, that's true, but it's not every man for himself.  Individual cyclists ride as members of teams, and it is the young and strong team members of Liqui-Gas Cannondale who are setting the pace in the peloton (the group of cyclists as a whole), protecting Sagan as he moves his way to the front, then catapulting him forward (by way of having a strong rider in front of him so that he can ride in the slipstream until the last seconds) so that he can be first across the line.  Liqui-Gas has always fielded an impressive team, but this year for the ATOC, they're stronger than anything else out there, at least for now.

These first days of the tour are similar to the first week of the Tour de France, in that they are characterized by consecutive stages of long rides (115-120 miles), with maybe some hills or small mountains thrown in, then a sprint finish.  Over time, the cyclists will tire, which will change up the overall standings.

And something else that will change the overall standings:  A time trial.  Today's stage in Bakersfield will not be a road race, but rather an individual time trial, in which riders will compete exclusively against the clock.  The man with the fastest time today wins the stage.  In the past, this is an event that has brought Levi Leipheimer to the top of the overall standings.  But with his still healing broken leg, it will be interesting to see how the day turns out.  No one is expecting Peter Sagan to win today.  But this young man is fired up, so we'll just have to see what happens.

I am thoroughly enjoying the coverage of the race on NBCSports with much beloved Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen commentating.  Good job, lads!  Keep up the good work!

Amgen ToC: Keep your eye on Peter Sagan

Photo from the official Amgen Tour of California website
Young Peter Sagan has won the first two stages of the Amgen Tour of California, but not without his share of trials and tribulations.  A stage winner in last year's ToC, Sagan rode smart yesterday in the first stage, sticking toward the front of the peloton as much as he could, waiting for his chance to sprint for the final win.  In the last miles of the race, he drew toward the front.  Then disaster struck six miles from the finish line:  A flat tire forced him to the side of the road, and someone from a team car jumped out and switched out his tire in under 20 seconds--which was just enough time for the entire peloton and all the team cars to roll past him.  Frantically he pedaled, jumping in and out of the spaces between cars until, just moments before they all reached the line, he joined the peloton, somehow wove himself through all the traffic and sprinted across the line in first.  Dang.  Give that boy a beer--and you can, because he's over the legal drinking age--but at 22, just barely.

In today's stage, Sagan used yesterday's tactic of staying safe in the peloton.  But in a bike race of this magnitude, no one is safe, and as Phil Liggett will say, you never know what you're going to find when you roll around a corner.  Today, what Peter Sagan found was a pile up.  A number of riders went down, and he found himself on the pavement, a bit shaken and appearing to favor his left arm.  He sat on the ground for precious seconds, checking his collar bones for fractures and stretching out his arms and back.  Finally, he was up and back on the bike.  Credit his valiant team members from Liquigas Cannondale for keeping him rolling through the remainder of the race, then setting the pace so high in the last miles that no one could break away to sprint for the finish.  They brought Peter home nicely, and he won Stage 2.

On another note:  I cannot express how thrilled I was to hear Phil Liggett say today that George Hincapie is set to ride in the Tour de France in July.  If all goes well, Hincapie will set a record as the first man to ride in 17 Tours de France.  Oh my Buddha, George, that's awesome.  Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.  Just don't crash out in the ToC.  Oh no, now I've jinxed you!

Last year's ToC winner, Chris Horner, is looking strong and confident.  He is biding his time, of course, not trying to win stages right now, just keeping his overall time with that of the peloton.  Soon, very soon, I think we'll see some action from Horner.  Can't wait!

It begins

A few of my friends believe that, for some unknown reason (at least to me), I became enamored of Lance Armstrong some years ago and began to watch professional cycling as a result. The truth is, I began watching cycling in the early 1980’s. At that time, there was an arrogant young punk named Greg Lemond who gifted the United States with some long-denied respect in the cycling world. When Lance came onto the scene a decade or so later, he was an arrogant young punk, too. But I liked his style, and it was fun, in those first years, to watch him battle it out with the Europeans in the Tour de France.


His fierce courage and bull-headed determination—especially after the cancer years—made the sport more interesting, for certain. But seeing those qualities plus an indomitable spirit in all my cycling favorites over the years is the lure that brings me eagerly back every year to planning 21 days in July around the Tour de France. Add to that, of course, the drama and intellectual stimulation of cycling’s particular chess game.

At least once a year someone mentions to me that they find cycling “boring,” or they don’t see what all the excitement could be about regarding ‘a bunch of guys in spandex riding bicycles.’ Which actually just reveals they’ve never watched a race. If you can’t appreciate the elite level of athleticism in these ‘guys in spandex,’ try riding 115 miles at an average speed of 30mph. Throw in some steep uphill climbs and maybe some sections of the road paved with cobblestones from the Sixteenth Century. If you’re still alive afterward, let me know how your ride went.

With the debut of Amgen’s Tour of California seven years ago, I now have a mini-drama right here in my own backyard in gorgeous sun-drenched California to look forward to every May. And that race begins today.

In recent weeks, the spring classics in Europe have been going full tilt, and fortunately for me, NBC Sports has been providing great coverage. I’ve watched big Tom Boonen win the Tour of Flanders and then, a week later, Paris Roubaix (his fourth win in the latter, tying a record). He will be here this week with the new team, Omega Pharma Quick-Step, and I’m excited to see how he negotiates the tough terrain of Mt. Baldy next Saturday.

Levi Leipheimer, a favorite of mine for years, will also be riding in the Amgen ToC this week. Levi survived a wicked crash in the second to last stage of the Paris – Nice race some weeks ago, only to be hit by a car during a training ride last month which result in a fractured fibula. Levi has won the ToC before, though he is saying at this point he doesn’t expect to be a contender in the overall standings. His leg is still on the mend, so props to him for coming out and competing anyway. How could he not? The ToC begins in Santa Rosa, where he currently resides.

Here’s hoping all my favorite guys ride safe, ride fair and sans performance enhancers for the next week. As I did last year, I will no doubt post quick daily updates on the race—if I’m not too busy watching.

Against the dying of the light

I have a friend, Willma (yes, that’s how it’s spelled), who lives in Sedona, Arizona. Of the writers I know personally, she is the most prolific. Some years ago, as I prepared to introduce her as guest speaker to my writers group, I asked her to remind me where she’d been published. She handed me a list with over thirty national publications on it—including Popular Mechanics.


“Wow!” I said. “How does a woman with a background in literature sell a piece to Popular Mechanics?”

“Well,” she replied, “you can sell a piece anywhere if you have the right slant.”

Thus her role as my mentor began. That same year I sent her something I’d written about The Grandson. She sent it right back, telling me, “Drop the last paragraph. You don’t need it. Make the second to last paragraph your first paragraph. Then send it to the Home Forum section of the Christian Science Monitor.” I did. And earned $185 for a piece that took me an hour to write.

A year ago, Willma published a memoir, Iron Grip. If you’re married, consider how you would respond if your spouse lost both of his hands in an explosion. Imagine if it happened in the first weeks of your marriage…. As I read through Willma’s book, I had to keep reminding myself that this was a true story, that the energetic, caustically funny, positive and productive woman I knew had endured a depth of heartache I had never known.

In recent weeks, Willma released a novel, Braving House Calls. The word is out that it’s funny, which doesn’t surprise me; her previous two memoirs, Just Pencil Me In and Something's Leaking Upstairs, reflect her wry sense of humor at life’s unpredictability. I’ll be grabbing the new book for my Kindle next time I’m down the mountain.

I sent Willma an email yesterday to let her know I was looking forward to coming out to AZ for her birthday party next month. Her reply said in part:

I still lead four writer workshops, each meeting twice a month. This is my “social” life—as much meet and greet as I want or need. And I have moved to the apartment next door to the one where you visited me. While I was able to move all the light stuff in boxes, my son Alan and another friend moved all the big stuff in two hours.

She also said she’s looking forward to that birthday party in June. Because, you know, you only turn 90 once.

Do not go gentle into that good night
Rage, rage against the dying of the light

~ Dylan Thomas

What the Amgen has to do with my pizza

Yesterday, to celebrate getting down to… a certain weight… I stopped on the way back up the mountain from my writers group meeting to order a pizza at Giuseppe’s. Giuseppe's is at the top of Euclid, just north of the Y split on the west side of the street. The restaurant serves Mediterranean and Italian food, so you can order a killer veggie kabob or a humus plate or lasagna or Persian ice cream, all of it scrumptious. You can also get pizza to go, so I thought I was being smart by calling ahead and ordering a pizza for pick up. My plan was to get up the mountain as fast as possible, then hang out on the back deck eating pizza and basking in the sunshine.


But yesterday the Amgen Tour of California (ToC) amateur stage was held in Mt. Baldy. It has a fancy name—L’Etape du California—whatever. Locals just call it the “Amateur Amgen.” For a substantial fee (some of which goes to cancer research), bike riders can attempt the route that the pros will ride in this year’s 7th stage of the ToC. Starting in Ontario, the route winds slowly up through the foothills, then partway up the mountain, then heads west for a good long time along the scenic but challenging Glendora Ridge Road, then comes back to Baldy Road and takes a vicious turn north, heading up the grueling switchbacks to finish at around 6500ft. elevation in the ski lift parking lot. Who’d wanna ride that? Crazy people, I’m tellin’ ya.

So I get my pizza and I start driving and my first thought is, “Oh my Buddha, that smells heavenly,” and I’m really, really hungry so I open the box at the last stop sign at Shinn Rd., thinking I might snag a piece to eat while I drive. But it’s too hot and too drippy, what with all that great sauce and melted cheese, so I close the box and think, “I’ll just hurry on home—I’m 20 minutes away!” What a goofhead….

Because there are all these cyclists on the road going up the mountain. And being a cyclist myself, I know what it’s like to try to ride on a narrow road with little or no room to move over when cars come roaring indignantly up from behind. So I put on my emergency flashers to warn the cars behind me and those that threaten to hit me head on, and I start passing small groups of cyclists huffing and puffing their way up the mountain. When I say “passing,” I mean pulling over into the southbound lane to give the riders a wide enough berth so they’re not having to think, “Is that truck going to plow into me?” while they’re nearly totally oxygen deprived.

So instead of 20 minutes, it takes me 40 to get home. And by then my pizza with the bubbly cheese and golden crispy crust is nearly cold. But I happen to have an oven…. So while I’m re-heating my amazing lunch/dinner, I get my backyard chair ready, my iced tea on the table, and I contemplate how exciting it’s going to be when my heroes get here on May 19th to ride our version of the Alpe d’Huez right here in Mt. Baldy. I. Can’t. Wait.

Sun and Snow

A week ago we had a snowstorm that left behind nearly a foot of soft powder. I spent the first day of the storm in front of a warm fire, reading and writing and watching the cats play. The next morning I walked the loop under lingering clouds, coming down from the falls to see only one other set of prints in the soft snow—those of T.J., the big red dog who is my neighbor. By the time I reached the cabin, it had begun to snow again, small flakes drifting down outside the window as I brewed a cup of tea. But by then I had used up the last of my firewood, so while the day was cold (30 degrees), and the snow continued, we had only the wall furnace to keep us warm. The cats and I huddled near it, happy for an abundance of spare blankets. I checked the weather report and reassured them: “Don’t worry, ladies. We’ll be warm by Wednesday.” Sure enough, the sun came out on Sunday, then gradually, with each passing day, the temperatures warmed.
Now it is Sunday again. Yesterday, wearing a short sleeved t-shirt and flip-flops, I cleaned up the detritus left behind by the storm. Afterward, I sat on the back deck reading a book, little Sugar Plum nearby basking in a warm sun spot. Today I opened half of the many windows in the cabin, knocked down cobwebs and turned on the ceiling fan to air out the dust. Now the cabin smells like the mountain, that fresh mix of pine and oak and spring wildflowers. With the windows open, I can hear the stream gushing along in the canyon just below us. Again this afternoon I sat outside and indulged in the luxury of reading for pleasure, the melody of a grosbeak’s mating song echoing from the canyon walls, Sugie wandering about the deck sniffing everything she hadn’t smelled since October. We are heady with the joy of it.

Oh, I know that our cold days are not yet behind us. Rain is predicted for Wednesday night and Thursday. But just this brief respite from the cold days, a hint and promise of the long delicious days of summer on the mountain, is enough to remind me of how quickly the circumstances of life can turn around.

An invitation....

Ellie Mae Murphy, smiling

On Monday, if I am brave, I will click the button that sends my manuscript, The Dogs Who Saved Me, off to the publisher. In July, if all goes well, I will hold the printed book in my hands.
Recent days have been filled with searching, searching, searching for typos; listening carefully to suggestions by my first readers; trying to find words to frame the perfect dedication (impossible)… and crying.

I think you’ll understand all the tears with this book once you read it. It’s amazing how we can be dropped to our knees by heartache but somehow, later, find the courage to get up and continue our trudge forward on the journey, telling ourselves we’re “over it”—until something happens to make us remember. In writing this book, I have had to recall some difficult times in my life. But I’ve also spent time remembering the dogs who saved me, and they’ve been on my mind a lot lately.

I remember Ruf, whose favorite toy was always a rock he’d find and bring to me to throw for him. I once threw a rock into a pond that was three feet deep just to see what he’d do. Yeah, he dove down to the bottom and retrieved it.

Ellie became my dog after my brother moved to Seattle and couldn’t take her with him. Two years later, he came down for a visit, and she had what can only be described as a transcendent ecstatic experience when she was reunited with him.

Alex Haley was the Rottweiler/Chow mix who was terrified of loud noises. (A car backfiring would send him diving into the closet, trembling in fear for half an hour.) And he was the dog who sat beside me—rock steady—while a drug-crazed man pounded on the doors and windows of my house, trying to break in.

These dogs are gone now… but not my memories of them.

I am saving a page in the front of my dog book to honor some of the dogs I know—and don’t know—who live on in the hearts of their human companions. If you’ve had a good dog (or two… or six), or you know of one, and you would like that dog to be remembered on that page, please leave the dog’s name in the comment section here. Or better yet, head over to the Facebook page for The Dogs Who Saved Me (<--just click on that blue writing) and leave a comment to my post. I’m gathering the names today (April 14, 2012) and tomorrow; they will be the last bits I add before clicking that ominous but important button on Monday morning.


Foreground: Nikita Fedrovna Baryshnikov Zhivago ("Niki")  Background:  Alex Haley

Time for a change

Ten years ago, just before I left for a writers conference in Big Bear, I stopped by the post office and picked up a package I'd been anxiously awaiting from Lands End. I opened the box to find a pair of brown leather hiking boots. Know how some women get excited over a new pair of stylish heels? Yeah, that's me with hiking boots. I put them on and wore them for the duration of the weekend, taking several long walks while at the conference. They fit perfectly. I loved them. They became my new best friends.


I wore them hiking in Azusa Canyon, climbing up the steep rock face to sit by my favorite secret waterfall.

I wore them hiking in Santa Anita Canyon, down the single track trail that leads along the stream to Hermit Falls, and I had them on that fateful Fourth of July when the ranger came by to say the gate at the bottom of the road would be closing early that night. I hurried down to find I'd been locked in… but I was rescued by a handsome stranger….

I wore them hiking in the red rock country of Sedona, Arizona, while on a visit to writer Willma Gore. I came back from that amble with red dust all over those boots… and I brought some home to Cali with me.

Of course, I wore them to hike in Mt. Baldy—up to Sunset Peak, up the trail to the Sierra Club hut, up to Bear Flats on the Bear Canyon trail, and of course, countless times on the Ice House Canyon Trail to Cedar Glen or the saddle. I had them on the day Patty Walker and I took a walk up that trail to Kelly's Camp. We started—lazily—at 9:00a.m. on a weekday in late summer. When we arrived at the saddle, she asked me if I'd brought food.

"Of course," I said, as I began pulling granola bars and grapes from my pack. She smirked and told me to put my food away, she'd brought enough for both of us. And then she began unpacking a feast—fresh mozzarella cheese floating in olive oil and bruschetta to slap it on, along with thick tomato slices. While I marveled at the miracle of the food reviving me, she fired up her camp stove and brewed some tea. When she pulled out the apricot tart, I asked her if I'd died on the trail and had arrived in heaven. We hiked on to Kelly's Camp that day to lie in the meadow in the afternoon sun and listen to the sound of water trickling from the mountain. On the way back down, as evening came on, we watched a doe and her fawn grazing on a far slope. We were gone ten hours that day. It is a piece of my life I hope I never forget.

Those plain brown hiking boots shared a lot of memories with me. And I wore them out, wore down the soles to the nubs and kept wearing them until the lacing unraveled.

Last week on Spring Break, I bought a new pair of hiking boots. It took some serious inner dialogue, but I finally had the courage to toss the old worn out boots in the trash.

Spring is all about renewal and rebirth. Can't wait to see what adventures these new boots take me on.

That sound you hear

Photo by Kathryn Wilkens (Boy, did I need a haircut!)
That sound you may be hearing—the muffled scrape of boot leather across a hardwood floor—is me, dragging my feet.

On Thursday, I wrote the preface to the dog book. That was the last piece I needed to finish in order to complete the manuscript. Yeah. So now it's really done. And printed (all 225 pages). And copied (all 225 pages 3 times—yikes). Now I have to wait while my first readers flip through those pages and pencil in their comments on the broad margins.

Oh dear. How do I wait? What do I do in the meantime?

I suppose I could start with all the activities and chores I have neglected in the past several months while I spent a good part of every weekend writing the book. Like vacuuming. I should vacuum. And cleaning the refrigerator. And reading the blogs I love. And getting that mid-year check of my cholesterol I promised my doctor. Ah well, that can wait.

I really can't focus on writing anything or accomplishing anything of substance until I know what my first readers think of Dogs. Picture me, trying to sit still, but getting up to pace back and forth across the cabin, stopping occasionally to gaze outside at the weather (snowing today), my eyes taking on that far-away glaze as I ponder what the response of these so-called friends might be. (Didn't you start reading it last night?? Shouldn't you have called already to say, 'Wow, I can't put it down!'???)

Since I can't currently attend to creative composition (my gosh; I didn't mean for that to be alliterative), let me just give you a small sneak peek below into what the dog book contains. (After all, the first readers shouldn't get all the fun.)

(The following excerpt is taken from the soon-to-be-released memoir by S. Kay Murphy, Lessons I Learned from the Dogs Who Saved Me.  As such it is fully copyrighted and cannot be reproduced or copied in any from without written permission from the author.)

One of the many transitions I found difficult in moving from Orange County to Mira Loma was adjusting to living in a rural setting. In Cypress, we had lived within bicycling distance of Disneyland, Knott's Berry Farm, and the ocean. In Mira Loma, we had to drive ten miles just to get to a supermarket, which was five miles outside of the closest large city, Riverside. But with my license, I could be in Riverside in a matter of twenty minutes. Often in the evenings, especially on weekends, I would borrow Mom's car and drive into the city, just to walk the long outdoor mall on the warm nights of Indian summer.

Of course, Rufus always went with me, and he was never on a leash. Back then, there was a series of fountains along the mall which had been created to resemble outdoor scenes, with grassy knolls and water running over rocks. Ruf and I would walk along the mall, looking in the windows of the shops that were closed for the day, stopping from time to time so Ruf could splash in the tumbling water.

There were no street lights in Mira Loma and no sidewalks. Walking alone along the streets at home would have been dangerous, I thought. Little did I know how vulnerable I was while walking in the lighted mall alone at night in Riverside.

Nowadays kids often walk with their heads down, texting on their phones or equally distracted by the music in their ears. For me, it was my contemplative nature that kept me looking always inward instead of noticing my surroundings. The young man's arm was around my waist before I'd had time to realize someone was beside me.

"Hey baby," he said quickly. "There's a party at my place right now. Wanna come?"

I was wearing a midriff top with hip-hugger jeans, the prevalent '60's style. I could feel his fingers pressing into the bare skin at my rib cage.

"No thanks," I muttered, trying to fake a polite tone. "I need to get—"

"What's your hurry?" he asked, with no pretense of politeness as he pulled my body toward him, his hand tightening as it slid up under my breast. I could feel the taut muscles in his arm hold fast as I tried to pull back. I was five feet, five inches tall and weighed just over a hundred pounds, a slip of a girl against a man who was nearly twice my weight and a head taller. My mind raced as I tried not to panic. Years before in a terrifying ordeal when a prowler had broken into a home where I was staying, I'd learned how our fight or flight response can shut down our cognitive abilities, paralyze our ability to speak… or scream.

Done

Did you hear it, a little over an hour ago? Perhaps not. It was one word, and it's not like I shouted. Sugar Plum (like me) is easily disturbed by loud noises. Still. I did say it out loud.


Booyah.

I have finished the dog book.

So thanks to all of you who put in your two cents' worth a year and a half ago and said, 'Yes, write that book.' Although I'll have you know it has been the most difficult writing I have ever done.

But it is… done. Oh my Buddha, it is finally done.

Now comes the fun part—editing, book design… and then release. I absolutely cannot wait.

One hundred percent of the net proceeds of this book will go to animal rescue.

Stay tuned; I'll need your help with all of that.

But for now… Booyah.

I would have told you sooner, but after the final keystroke, I just had to take a walk with Dolly Parton, Evanescence, Yo Yo Ma, Ladysmith Black Mambazo and others to celebrate. Special thanks to John Mayer for reminding me that it's OK to "say what you need to say."

So yes, that was me, up by the waterfall in full rain gear… dancing.