Billy Yang makes great films, usually of him or his friends running. His New Year’s post had a great quote in it from a poem by Mary Oliver, The Summer Day. I now suppose it’s oft quoted, but I had never read it previously:

“…

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?”

Best quote from this: “Always choose the window seat”

Gordy Ainsleigh, the first finisher of the Western States 100 (before it was even a footrace) and thus the father of ultrarunning once said, “Life is just too easy. Society is so cushioned that we have no opportunity for struggle. People are bred to struggle. We need to express that or else be incomplete.”

Photo courtesy of likesuccess.com

This is a screen cap from Closer to the Edge, a documentary about the insane Isle of Man Time Trials. It would probably be a good sign to have up before we board the ride that is “life”: