Live As if Everything Were a Miracle
“Someone said there are only two ways to live your life: one is as if nothing is a miracle, the other is as if everything is. I’ve always been convinced Havana is an annexed colony of the latter…
“I was sitting in the rafters next to a father and son for the morning set of fights going on during the Cuban National Boxing Championships held at Kid Chocolate gymnasium in Old Havana. My high school gym might’ve cost more to build, but with hundreds of millions of dollars you couldn’t recreate what this place looks like.
“The murals and chipped paint and scoreboards and rafters and ceiling takes your breath away — yet it’s the faces in the crowd that steal the show. The tickets don’t cost anything for Cubans. Everyone can come. There’s no advertising anywhere. Even though there are Olympic champions in the ring periodically who could cash in to the tune of millions, most don’t. Nobody here is making a dime off world class ability.”
Brin Friesen writes about Cuba, and boxing in Cuba, in an excerpt from his ongoing memoir/novel The Domino Diaries, over at the Nervous Breakdown.
posted: 09 December 11
under: The City Word
Why’d you change my title?
I completely do not understand this question. Do you mean to say your book is not called The Domino Diaries?
My *book* is indeed called The Domino Diaries, however the title of this article is called “Live As if Everything Were a Miracle” which was not the title *I* gave to the article. Which is why I was curious you decided to change my title.
I wasn’t asking with hostility, I was just curious.
Ah! Okay, now I understand you. The answer is, I often take a resonant line from the piece I’m blogging about as a title for the post! Just using the same title as the piece you want to draw attention to is kind of lazy, in my opinion, and whenever I see that I wonder if the writer really read the piece they’re writing about.
So, how’s the book coming along?
Okay, we’re on the same page. And I wanted to mention that I appreciate you posting my piece on your site. I’ve looked over what you’ve got going and I’m impressed. Please feel free to take any of the other chapters you find appealing and put them up here if you like.
The book is progressing. I’ve finished about 8 chapters of it so far but also I’ve been spending a lot of time lining up contacts and interviews. Something I’m new to. Boxing promoters, film makers, Cuban icons, trainers in America who work with defected Cubans, trainers in Cuba, setting up a travel itinerary (Miami, LA, Havana, NYC), ex-fighters, and, most recently, I’ve been trying to get Mike Tyson on the phone and seem to have finally made that happen as of next Monday. It may surprise you, but from all the top level people I’ve talked to, Mike Tyson is regarded the greatest boxing historian on the planet. AND he visited Cuba in 2002. So hopefully there’s material there we can discuss.
How things going for you?