Martin Dugard's Blog, page 4

As Herbert Viola tells Tom Cruise in Risky Business, sometimes you just have to say "WTF."

I'm abbreviating, but you know what I mean. So it is that I took my longtime friend Chris Teske up on a mileage run to Honolulu. He's trying to add to his already formidable number of lifetime United miles. I had a little Taking Midway research to follow up on before 2nd Pass hits my inbox.

The journey goes something like this: buy the cheapest possible economy ticket from Orange County to Honolulu. Work the upgrade. Fly to Hawaii. Spend eight hours enjoying the sights and smells of a tropical paradise. Watch the sunset. Fly home. Total elapsed time: 27 hours.

I love travel, as you well know, dear reader. I'm also inclined to be in the middle of a writing day and get a faint whiff of longing for my favorite places (Mammoth, Hawaii, and of course, London). So this was a chance to indulge. Instead of wishing for that wonderful sense of peace and acceptance known as Aloha, I would experience it directly, Plus, it's been an adventurous six months here on the homestead I am not owed a breath but I sure could use one. A bemused Calene told me to have a good time.

I knew going in that this would be a test: long direct flight, short turnaround, cramped seating if the upgrades didn't materialize. Fourteen of those twenty-seven hours would be spent in the air. I brought a book in my Thule travel backpack (Rick Atkinson and World War II), my laptop, my travel journal, and a change of clothes. Charger. Noise-cancelling headphones. All aboard.

Left the house at 5 a.m. Saturday morning and got back at 9 a.m. Sunday. What I remember most is not the flights, but the experiences: breakfast burrito at Urban Tortilla in the SFO E Terminal, wandering Compass Books (and finding a copy of Taking Paris), the smell of the tropics that smacks you in the face like a warm washcloth as you first step out of the terminal in HNL, wandering Waikiki which is like wandering Las Vegas or New Orleans, only with a better sunset. Followed up on the Midway stuff.

Early in my career, I covered a lot of events on Oahu: Oceanfest, mountain bike racing at Kualoa Ranch, Xterra. Calene and I took the boys when we could. Sometimes I went alone. We traveled on a shoestring. So wandering around Waikiki late on a busy Saturday afternoon was an exercise in nostalgia. The first thing Calene asked when I got home was whether or not the Denny's by the Outrigger Reef was still there. We used to enjoy a cheap breakfast and the waitress was a commanding woman named Pinky. Yes, I told Calene, it's still there. I made sure to check. Not sure about Pinky. It's been thirty years.

Chris and I checked out a couple dive bars, had dinner and watched the sunset from the Elks Club in the shadow of Diamond Head (Chris is a member. Forget any preconceptions you might have about an Elks Club. This place on the water was magical), then Uber'ed back to the airport. Got the upgrade for the flight back, so I was able to sleep on the packed redeye. Made the connection in SFO with two minutes to spare then fell right back to sleep as the sun rose over San Francisco Bay.

Was such a short trip exhausting? Yes — but not as much as it was exhilarating. One great thing about travel is perspective. You step away from daily routine, inevitably, you examine your life from afar. I always thought I needed a week or at least a weekend for that sort of insight. Turns out a whirlwind 27 hours that makes absolutely no sense does the exact same thing.

Would I do it again? Not tomorrow, but yes. Sometimes you just have to say WTF.

Credit: Southland CD via Ebay

Never underestimate the value of loud music.

My stereo system went down a couple years ago. I didn't know where to go to get it fixed. So my turntable and receivers and speakers sat silent in a corner of my office below the framed Bruce Springsteen "Night for the Vietnam Veteran" poster. My vinyl collection on the bottom shelf of the bookcase remained unplayed. I went in and out of my office each day, consumed by one creative writing demand or another, until I slowly forgot I'd ever ended my work day with Side One of something extremely loud with lyrics that touched my soul.

Then my oldest son got me a new set of speakers for Christmas. State of the art. I couldn't very well leave them in the box, so I did a little research about getting my stereo fixed. Not surprisingly, people specializing in that sort of thing don't have a place at the mall, or even sandwiched between CVS and Board & Brew here in RSM. What I found was a little old man with an indiscriminate accent nestled in an industrial park ten miles away next to the 5 freeway, in a small cramped warren between a gym and a man selling golf carts. The stereo guy only takes cash. His workspace was floor to ceiling with all manner of audio equipment, much of it vintage.

"One week," he said, accepting $60 to begin the work.

Seven days later he called. I hit the ATM and headed down to pay the rest of the bill. We said our goodbyes and I said my thank yous, knowing I would come back to this sweet guy's shop if I ever had another problem, also wondering if he would be alive when that happened.

I am not good with electronics. Wires frustrate me. But I very carefully read the instruction manual for the new speakers and hooked everything up. Put a record on the turntable — The Blasters Greatest Hits. Pressed play.

Nothing happened.

But as the record kept spinning I reached around the back of the receiver and changed a couple output wires. Boom. The room exploded in rock and roll. I had music again. I began singing along at the top of my lungs, the music so loud I couldn't even hear myself. We have another turntable in the house but that's too civilized a space to crank the sound. But my office is primitive. No need for niceties.

Calene came into my office to tell me she was leaving to run an errand and I didn't even know she was there. Sometimes when you put something off, then put it off longer until it feels like a task you're never going to complete, no matter how small, it becomes a burden you don't even know you're carrying. So getting my music back put a big smile on my face. A weight was lifted.

Yesterday was Saturday. My team had a fantastic morning trail run in O'Neill. I went to Lowe’s and bought some soil for my new backyard project, a mini-forest. Look them up. Pretty cool. I practiced my guitar, worked on my French. Read. Watched two football games (poor Lions!), then migrated back to my office on a non-writing day and selected 180 grams of thick vinyl from the bottom shelf and dropped the needle.

Turn it up, turn it up, turn it up, turn it up.

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I texted a friend in the middle of the fires last week. Checking in to see if everything was ok. That's something of a courtesy around here. We're all subject to wildfires, with the Santa Ana winds, smoke-filled skies, and the nuisance ash that covers cars and windshields. I live in the shadow of Saddleback Mountain, which was denuded by flames back in September. The vegetation is completely gone. Ever since, all that bare soil gets whipped up when the Santa Anas blow, dropping a fine layer of grit on my backyard. I've power washed it and bought a big industrial broom to sweep it all up, but no sooner do I clean it all up than a new layer of wind deposits more silt. It's maddening.

My point is that we're used to all this in Southern California. My youngest son had to evacuate. He's here at home now. Loads of friends also had to pack up and run, but they're all safe. So when I texted my friend I expected the usual response, which is always some variation on "We're fine."

Instead, his response was this:

We lost everything.

There's a mistaken belief that the homes burned by this week's fires all belonged to rich people. But there are a lot regular folks who bought homes in those areas back when they were affordable. So I find myself disappointed in humanity to read comments on X and Facebook that these people who lost everything don't deserve pity because they're rich or elite or just plain Californian. Whether rich or middle class, loss is loss. Prayers and emotional support don't come with a worthiness clause.

The question that haunts me in all this is the concept of starting over. How, exactly, does one go about that process? Many people grabbed their most precious memories before fleeing the flames. I guess that's a start — a core to build upon. I don't know what I would select. Grab Calene. Put the dogs in the back seat. Rush back inside for the passports and a laptop. Go. Where, I'm not sure.

Then what?

I'm a planner. Not the sort that writes protocols, more like a dreamer making lists of next adventures. Losing everything is unthinkable but it happens. It's not just a fire or a flood or a tornado that upsets a life. Sudden tragedy can come any time.

Hard questions. I've got no easy answers.

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I'm starting a podcast. It's time. Bloomberg is reporting this morning that "the business of history is booming," which is a far cry from a recent comment by a prominent publisher that "non-fiction is dead." It's also been noted that academic history is being replaced by a trend towards popular history, in which I may have played a small role. Now it's time to capitalize. Cool but scary.

Thanks to my good friend John Burns for sending the link.

I think I could be good at this. I worked in professional radio while in college (WBKX and WMQT), which seemed to come easily. There are issues about format and whether I want to have a co-host (maybe) and whether or not to have guests (less maybe). There is equipment to purchase and questions about distribution, all of which must be answered. But what it comes down to is the fact that I am a history nerd who could use a diversion mid-book to get my head out of the sand and indulge my many curiosities.

I've considered a pod (as cyclist Geraint Thomas calls his own successful podcast) for a long time. One reason is getting the word out about my books. The other is keeping busy. Sometimes months can pass between writing a book proposal, its sale, and beginning the writing process. I am like a caged animal if I don't have something to write about every day. This could be a good way to find another creative outlet.

It's scary. I'll admit that. I've gotten into a very comfortable rut with my routines. Too comfortable. Yes, life has been full of very real distractions lately — anxiety-inducing, head-spinning, unreal issues that have me spending a great deal of time questioning the concept of mortality. I've managed my stress through trail runs, body weight rucking (who needs a special backpack when you're carrying a few extra pounds?), and an odd new habit I've developed of reading the morning paper on a park bench with a view of Saddleback Mountain. Very calming. But in the midst of all that I'm restless. I want a new challenge. So a pod it is.

I like to hold back making major announcements. But I'm putting this out there to get a little energy behind this new plan. A stiff wind, if you will.

Whew. I'm nervous. Let's go.

The Queen is back in her castle. All is right in the world.

Thanks for the warm wishes last week. The community that has sprung forth from this blog is notable for its kindness, for which I am grateful. It's also nice to see some familiar names that followed this space as far back as the Tour de France days still checking in. Say what you will about social media and the internet, but I lucked out with this readership.

So, thanks.

The boys came home for Christmas. At one point, we talked books. I do not want to give the impression that we gather around the hearth and have a literary salon on a regular basis, because I have been told on more than one occasion that this is what people think writers do.

But that's what happened. As we sat before the fireplace on Christmas night, the discussion turned to books. The usual: what everyone's reading, not reading, favorite books, favorite authors. Kindle versus hardcover. Very pop culture. Not a word about the classics. It came up that my oldest son's wife has a fondness for Russian history, but had not read A Gentleman in Moscow. It's fiction. I think everyone should read it at least once. I've given copies to several friends.

I keep a short list of books I want the world to read. A very short list, actually. Other than Taking London and the other Taking books, that list is limited to Michael Herr's Dispatches and Amor Towles' A Gentleman in Moscow. I even keep extra copies in my library to give away as needed. Brand new. Never opened. Ready to gift in the hope it will bring joy.

And so it was that I rushed to my office, grabbed a book, and handed Anne a brand new copy of A Gentleman in Moscow.

The conceit when you gift someone a book you love very much is that you must never ask whether or not they liked it, or even read it. This is not college — no required reading lists, no tests. It's about the simple pleasure of reading. If that individual circles back in a couple weeks or a couple months or a couple years and remarks that they loved or hated the book, then we can have a discussion.

I also recently did this with Taking Midway — though for the very selfish reason of wanting a knee-jerk reaction. I gave a few friends the manuscript. Among these was a Vietnam War navy vet. The response was unanimous, not only saying nice things about the storytelling and narrative voice, but in the case of the navy guy, penning notes in the margins. Man, when you sweat every word in every sentence and people come back to tell you that your instincts were right... that's a great feeling.

Yet it's different when it's one of my books that I hand off because I am seeking ways to make it more bulletproof. As I've written many times before, authors are competitive. So when I fanboy for another writer because their work is so great, my words are very genuine.

If you have time this week, take a moment and drop me an email about which favorite book you suggest most to friends. This isn't a contest, just a curiosity. If you want to take it one step further, give away a book as a new year's gift to someone who has done something kind for you in 2024. I believe a well-chosen book means more, and says more about your genuine friendship than almost any gift imaginable.

Happy New Year. May your 2025 be filled with hope, love, travel, and at least one book that fills your soul.

Got a new book deal last week. It's equal parts running and history, which is all I can say right now. This is the first time in my career I've combined my two passions. I'm very excited. As I've traveled deeper into my career, I'm happy to be taking on projects that really test my creativity and storytelling. This is one of those books. Frankly, I thought Taking Paris was a challenge. Then Berlin and London. Taking Midway was so over-the-top demanding there were days I would sit here at the writing desk and wonder how in the world I was going to pull all the disparate threads together. I'm really excited to share it with all of you when it hits stores in May.

Until then, I will be writing the new book. I'll start the first of the year. It's always good to have a significant date for the start and the deadline. They loom just a little taller. I used to always shoot for a Valentine's Day completion date, if only because that's the anniversary of Captain Cook's death and seems historically significant. But that's not on the agenda for 2025. It used to be that I could write books in forty days (Survivor, Knockdown, Chasing Lance) but I'm not up for that anymore. I think it's actually dangerous to one's health to live on a six-week cocktail of work, adrenaline, and cortisol.

Usually, the first person I tell when I get a new book contract is Calene. We celebrate. Maybe go out to dinner. And so it was this week. I took the call from my agent, agreed to the terms, then leaned over to tell Callie.

Only she couldn't hear me. The ICU nurse heard me. My sister-in-law Cate heard me.

But Callie had another deep internal bleed of unknown origins this week. Another 911 call. Another ambulance ride. Another ER code. She was sedated and deep asleep from Monday until Saturday. I told her again about the book deal yesterday. This time she gave me a nice smile.

I can't explain accurately how all this feels. On the one hand, the feeling of content that comes with knowing I'm about to tackle a storytelling challenge. It's one of the most fulfilling sensations I know, which is why I'm writing this blog on a morning when I would rather not. I've wandered around in a fog the past two months as we've gone through four near-death experiences.

Last night I realized I needed to do something other than stare at the wall. So I worked out this morning with my trainer, went for a short run, and now write in the same sweaty hoodie and running shorts I wore on the trail. It's been eight weeks of takeout pizza, a small army of friends that check in to make sure my morale is stable, and answering texts about Calene's status. I go to bed crazy early, sleep ten hours, and wake up exhausted. I have hard conversations with my sons. I remind myself that my wife is one of the toughest people on this earth and that she will one day be back at full strength, so I'd better keep myself fit and ready for that moment.

Our first Christmas was 1986. She gave me a watch and a small handwritten document which she framed, and I still keep on my desk. It's a few lines from 2 Corinthians:

"We are pressed on every side by troubles, but not troubled and broken. We are perplexed because we don't know why things happen as they do. But we don't give up and quit. We fix our eyes not on what is seen, but is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

All these years later, those words still speak to me. We've all got something going on in our lives, even during the holiday season. Whatever is going on with you and yours, please accept love and warm greetings from the Dugard family.

I'm doing First Pass edits on Taking Midway. I've written about this step in the publishing process before. The pages arrived a week ago in PDF form, typeset and paginated to look the way they will in print. My job is to proof for corrections, not rewrite the book. This massaging is my favorite part of the process because I also use it to correct clunky sentences and word repetitions. "Echo" is the copy editor's term for a word used too many times. With Midway, I used the description "mighty" sixteen times. After a while even a casual reader will get the feeling I've been lazy so those have to be corrected. I'm down to two mighties now. I took utter delight in substituting "Brobdignagian" for one of them. Editing can be fun.

But not too much fun. Like I said, this isn't time to rewrite the book. Corrections should be functional. And even though my edits aren't due back in New York until January 3, I'm sending it back tomorrow. The temptation to make edit after edit would be too great if I used all of those two weeks.

Coincidentally, I read an interview with James Salter recently. He's gone now, but he is one of my favorite writers. His spare style is impossible to mimic but it is a great inspiration to do a lot with a few words. A long while ago, Salter did a most unusual thing. Dissatisfied with one of his early novels, The Arm of Flesh, he rewrote it completely almost forty years later. Crazily, the publisher published Cassada, as it was retitled. Salter said he did the rewrite because the original read like the work of a student and as he grew as a writer he knew how to make it better.

I resist the urge to reread my early stuff because I know I'll feel the same way. I wouldn't rewrite Into Africa because that required ten complete edits before it went into print. I'd change a line or two in Training Ground. There's no changes needed for the Killing series because they're not those kind of books. And by that, I mean works for hire, which takes editorial decisions out of my hands.

But there is one book I would really like to rewrite: Chasing Lance. It's my travelogue about the 2005 Tour de France. I came back from the Tour and wrote it in forty days to beat my deadline. It's a very popular book and sold quite well. One of my favorites.

The story is told as I drive around France for twenty-three days, as much about wine and history as a bike race. Bob Babbitt drove with me the first week, Calene joined me for five days in the Alsace and Switzerland (a memorable dinner at Jay's in Metz, followed by a night in an old hotel with a lumpy mattress), and Austin Murphy was in the car until the finish in Paris. I was the last to arrive at my hotel that Saturday night before the finale and they had given away my room, so they gave me the penthouse suite, complete with a perfect rooftop view of the Eiffel Tower.

But to keep it simple, I didn't mention Babbitt or Callie at all. Austin was the perfect foil and I built the road trip around him. If I could get a do-over, I would add depth and a little more humor by adding them. At the time I wrote Chasing Lance, whether due to the deadline or my inability to tell a more complex story then, I took the easy route.

I don't see me covering the Tour again. Ten years was enough. But I'd really love to right that wrong by penning another road saga. Something fun and not ponderous, just an adventure involving travel, hotels, history, and a fast car. RIght now, with winter setting in, that sounds like a blast. Maybe follow the Springsteen tour around Europe...

Now wouldn't that be a blast?

How did we get here? This started as a blog about editing. Let's just say Calene's back home and my creative mojo is flowing. One way or another, I'll write another road trip book. And this time I'll get it right.

The lights are hung. Mantel decorated. Tree standing tall next to the piano, covered in ornaments, listing ever so slightly. Alexa playing Christmas music. Today, I'm going to buy a small tree for the courtyard and decorate it with the ceramic C9 lights I picked up at Lowe's. I couldn't believe they still had Christmas lights for sale after Thanksgiving.

We're not doing a card this year. Actually, we stopped sending cards once the boys grew up. I used to write a Christmas letter, believing that because I'm an author my Christmas letters were somehow less annoying than the rest of the world's. I keep them all in a file. Went back to have a look at them not so long ago. They are a snapshot of what was going on in our lives each of those years.

Reading between the lines, I can see the attempt at craftsmanship I put into writing them. Took me days, Literally. I polished and polished and polished like they were great works of art. Alas, like all Christmas letters, they are precious to me and our family, but I'll bet they were as annoying as fuck to those dozens of friends and relatives on our Christmas card list.

Here's an example from 2014:

Greetings from the Dugard Household...

...where an impossibly large Noble Fir stands like a sentinel in our living room. I have nicknamed it the BFCT, and mention its enormity only because twenty-five Christmases ago we had a very different sort of tree. Calene and I were newly married. We had literally nine dollars to our name, which didn't leave much in the budget for presents, let alone a Noble Fir. I found a scraggly little wimp of a pine at a storefront lot; a tree so broken and destitute that I was sure all the other trees had taken turns picking on it. This tree stood less than five feet tall. Calene was less than impressed when I brought it home. But we put it in a stand, threw on a single strand of lights, manufactured a few presents to slip beneath its boughs, and had a pretty magnificent Christmas., wondering all the while what the future would hold. Thus, the family legend of the Charlie Brown tree was born. Its memory becomes more cherished as the years pass — if only as a reminder to never come home with a tree like that again.

We had a friend once who wrote a long and intimate Christmas letter sharing every nuance of the year — every new child, first tooth, report card, and most jarring of all, medical procedures. Plural. Take it from a writer, we all need a good edit. I learned from those particular letters, realizing that the whole world doesn't really want to know about the maladies that intrude upon our Christmas season. It's too close. Too personal. Just one jolt shy of talking about your sex life.

With that in mind, let's just say we had an unexpected communion with a very different set of red lights last week. It wasn't even the first time this month I had to call an ambulance. The house is waiting for my sweetie to come home. Then we can turn our thoughts to Christmas.

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Cross country season is over. Twenty-four weeks of training and racing came to an end yesterday at the California State Meet. My girls team took third place in our division and made the podium. It was a hard-fought conclusion to the double days, Saturday long runs, summer camp, and those many days in between that make for the consistency needed to become a champion.

The girls were ecstatic. I felt the glow of a top finish and did a little jig. Made it home from Fresno and downloaded to Calene about the great weekend until I was talked out. She listened patiently, then resumed watching SVU. My queen loves her murder mysteries.

The emotional hangover began at nine a.m., when I finally rolled out of bed. As always, the high of winning is replaced by just a hint of burnout. I dreamt about stats and peaking. An intense weekend of Thanksgiving followed by travel, racing, and back to travel. I saw so many good friends in the coaching world and had a few laughs while in Fresno. Track season doesn't start for five weeks, which means a ton of well-earned downtime. It's this way every year.

But instead of asking myself what I would do differently as a coach in terms of workouts, I find myself questioning why the weekend felt so lonely. In the midst of all that love and team spirit, I came home feeling like I'd made some bad solitude choices. You may remember last week's blog, when I wrote about my routine for the State Meet. Most of it revolved around avoiding people so I could focus on the racing. I got to the course at 6 a.m. for instance, after eating a solitary dinner the night before, then locking myself in my room to watch college football until it was time to wake up and run.

I cling to that routine to calm my pre-race anxiety. But it's flawed. It was born at a time when I had my own kids on the team, Calene traveled to State with me. Friends like Hempy, Burkhardt, Burns, the Cyborg, and many others rose with me before dawn to arrive at the course early. We'd BS in the dark and watched the sunrise. It was often very cold. Hempy was the one who got me in the habit of arriving at Starbucks just as they opened.

As I shivered alone in the dark yesterday morning, eager to walk the course as the sun rose, I realized that those guys made the State Meet process a communal gathering instead of a solitary repetition of the same routine, year after year. I never realized how much I missed them until I woke up this morning and wondered what I need to do different next year.

Will I change the workout structure next season? Of course. A few new wrinkles are always a good thing. But the biggest change will come at State. I won't eat dinner alone. I won't arrive at the course before sunrise, all by myself. And I won't make the Irish Exit, leaving in the midst of postrace celebration to make my solitary way back home, when I could stick around an extra half-hour and soak it all in.

Writing and coaching are solitary professions. I'm a solitary guy. But there's a lot going on in my world right now, and for that I need people. So, yes, things will change — and I'm not waiting a whole year to start the process.

My Thanksgiving week began Saturday at precisely 9:24 in the morning. I was standing atop Reservoir Hill at Mt, San Antonio College cross country course. My girls team was racing for their Southern California division title. The fifth and final scoring runner crossed the finish line at 32 seconds past the minute.

Reservoir is a lofty viewpoint, allowing coaches to not only cheer for their runners as they make their climb to the summit, but also follow their progress back down the hill into the stadium for the finish. I was frantically refreshing the Finished Results app to get a final score. I had promised the girls that if everyone improved by twelve seconds we would win. Tim Sharpe, a longtime rival, suddenly appeared at my side. We've been doing battle for fifteen years. I love the guy. He was also refreshing his phone.

The final score came up, showing we had finished second. Not only had my runners improved by twelve seconds each, some had improved by as much as 25 in just one week. Sadly, the winning team's girls also improved by the same margin. We lost, but made the podium and moved on to State next week in Fresno. Tim's girls, which now run in a different division, also finished second. A great day for two coaching nerds.

So while the rest of America thinks of what comes in the next few days as Thanksgiving, I think of it as the final training week punctuated by a large meal on Thursday. This is Week 24 of our progression. We will peak and sharpen from 8-10 a.m. each day. They will run on their own Thanksgiving Day.

As for the holiday meal, Callie and I usually have the entire family over, all 30 or more distant relatives. But we're keeping it calm this year. Just the two of us and the boys and their significant others. We're going non-traditional, doing rib eye. My Aunt Catherine has been kind enough to send my grandmother's ziti recipe. Devin is bringing something green to eat. Liam is making a pie. Connor will be there late, coming from work. Calene and I will toddle off to bed around 9 pm, whereupon the real party will start.

By the time the boys wake up, I'll be on a plane for Fresno. Driving the 5 on Thanksgiving weekend lost its allure years ago. I fly. The team takes a van. I'll meet the girls in Fresno, where they'll jog the course the day before the race. Check in. Pick up race bibs. BS with old coaching friends. Then it's back to the hotel. Dinner at the House of JuJu. A burger, precisely two beers, then back to my room, lock the door at 6 pm, and watch college football until it's time to go to sleep. Up at 4:30, be the first person at Starbucks, jog the course as the sun rises while listening to an old Springsteen bootleg (San Siro from the Rising Tour). Greet the team when they arrive around 8. Last-minute strategy talk. Then wait nervously until race time. Head out onto the course to cheer. Hope for the best. Madly refresh Finished Results as they begin crossing the finish line. This has been my routine for more years than I can remember.

I hope for a win. Like coaches everywhere, it's out of my hands now. Hay is in the barn. I'm thankful for yesterday's podium spot. We won a nice plaque. I can't wait for this final week of training. Thanksgiving Day will be a blast. Being in Fresno on Thanksgiving Saturday is an honor, for which I am also deeply thankful. Should we make the podium again, that would have me walking on air.

But it's been an eventful few months in our household, thanks to the scourge of cancer and its side effects. More than anything this Thanksgiving week, I give thanks for my sweetie and the fact that she's not allowed to lift a finger on Thursday.

If, for some reason, you are taking the people you love for granted right now, don't. There is the stuff we do that gives us joy and the people who we love that make it all matter. Happy Thanksgiving.