A Day in LA

It was a picturesque day in LA in about 1980. I was about to go for lunch in Century City as I crossed an open plaza. 

In that plaza in a boxing ring with many strands of gray hair, was Muhammed Ali sparring with another fighter. When he was young his trainer said he floated like a butterfly and stung like a bee. There wasn’t much floating and no one was getting stung. At 38, he was a mere whisper of the fighter he had been.

One of the iconic figures of that century had met his match, Father Time. I only saw him again when he lit the torch at the 1996 summer Olympics in Atlanta, still, loved by people in every corner of the earth.