“A friend of mine gave me really great advice last year—she said, ‘Start slow, and then fade.’” —Kevin Schmidt, Courtney Dauwalter’s husband, at the starting line of his first-ever 100-mile ultramarathon (video)
Bruce Springsteen or Stephen King?
Joy Priest writes “I Feel Most Southern In The Hip-Hop Of My Adolescence,” a creatively-presented piece about growing up, and the importance of the rap songs of that era (there’s a Spotify playlist you can listen to while you read).
This is from 2016, but I just heard about it while listening to Lisa Congdon’s book Finding Your Artistic Voice: Ayumi Horie, a potter in Portland, Maine, and Elise Pepple, stamped neighborhood memories onto bricks and used them to fill in India Street in Portland. You can see some of the bricks on the project’s Instagram page here.
If you are a Murakami fan, you might enjoy reading this piece about when he first came to the U.S. and the beginning of his worldwide success (excerpted from a new book about how Murakami became such an internationally renowned author)
I don’t know if it’s for everyone, but I just listened to Acid for the Children, Flea’s memoir of growing up (the book ends with the beginning of the Red Hot Chili Peppers), and I’m still thinking about some of the stuff in it several days later, including hearing him getting emotional while reading his own writing for the recording of the audiobook. (thanks to my friend Ed Roberson for the recommendation a few months ago)
Filmed By Bike is doing a YouTube livestream film festival event called HIGH VIS Celebrating BIPOC Cyclists and their Stories on October 2 and 3—tickets are pay-what-you-can and are available here. (P.S. my short film Chocolate Spokes is one of the films)
And hey:
These Friday Inspiration posts are able to continue thanks to the handful of wonderful people who back Semi-Rad on Patreon for as little as $1 a month. If you’d like to join them, click here for more info—you’ll also get access to the Patreon-only posts I write, as well as discounts to my shop and other free stuff.
—Brendan