Ivana Bednářová | archiv Lucie Výborné
Lucie Výborná. The voice we know from morning broadcasts on Czech Radio. Creator of a TV talk show. A woman who embarks on polar expeditions while keeping her feet firmly on the ground as a mother and wife. And now also the author of her fourth book Unfinished Adventures. We talked about the trips that didn’t end as planned and the small joys of everyday life.
Your fourth book is called Unfinished Adventures. We always hear about expeditions that turned out great. What led you to write about the ones that remained ‘open’?
I didn’t manage to complete the journey to the South Pole and since the book includes my diary of the polar expedition, I thought about how people view me. I figured that most of the time people view me as a person who gets everything right, so I decided to add to the book moments when things didn’t go as planned. In our nicely organised and well-insured world, the level of certainty is always rising, but on expeditions or trips things often happen differently than planned. There is a story in the book from Ladakh, where I was supposed to be the main character of the story and I ended up as a nurse in an Indian hospital because a friend had an accident and there was no one to take care of him. I got him medicine, food, and slept in the intensive care unit under his bed in the conditions I describe in the book. But I’ve gained so much more.
Your writing began with Fit Mom, a very feminine and personal topic. Now we’re getting to polar diaries and extreme expeditions. How are your books and yourself changing?
Fit Mom was actually more of an educational book – I wanted to exercise when I was pregnant, but everyone dissuaded me from that. There was no book of this type on the market, so I wrote it. When my daughter was ten years old, I started going back to the mountains. And the mountains change you. I’m not an adventurer, as people sometimes call me. I love nature, its beauty in every detail, the frosted rowanberries on the trees covered by the first snow, the birds of prey circling the rocks, the moments when you climb on the frozen plains to an alpine peak and the snow around you begins to shimmer in the pastel colours of the dawn… I love winter, I cherish the discomfort, because it has partly made me who I am.
Apart from the book, we now have the chance to see you on a TV talk show. What’s it like conducting an interview in front of the cameras – is it different than on the radio or even writing a book?
Television talk shows are a different discipline. You know, I don’t think a talk show is necessarily a fun factory and people should be falling out of their chairs laughing every minute. I’m still concerned about that thing that is generally starting to disappear these days – content. But on TV, unlike on radio, I have three guests and it’s actually a joint conversation between all of us, because the guests have one topic in common. A conversation on the radio or on my podcast goes more into depth, it’s more intimate, it can open up more topics… It‘s just different.
You live a very intense life – the radio show in the morning, family, travels, TV and now a book. Do you have a ritual that gives you inner peace? What’s your little everyday luxury?
Walking the dogs! Meditation. Slow exercise. Good coffee. Unexpected smile. Deep breath. Long sleep. A sentence that makes me think… There are so many things to think about! I am aware of the luxury that surrounds us – I realise it every day. I know none of this lasts forever and I soak up even seemingly ordinary moments like a sponge! I’m restless, thirsty for life. In the solitude of my long skiing or backpacking hikes, I straighten my thoughts and clear my head. Sometimes I miss the mountains and my presence in them so intensely that I have to rearrange my schedule so that I could go for a run along the ridges of the Krkonoše Mountains. The air smells of autumn, dawn is breaking and, as I take in the crisp and slightly frosty air into my lungs and my feet start to run, I am ready to embrace the thought that there is something divine inside us.
Your book has ‘unfinished’ in the title. Does it apply to life? Is it still a matter of beauty if some things remain unfinished?
I guess it depends on who you are. I enjoy open endings in literature and film, they give you room for your own solutions. But because I’ve been working intensely on a podcast series on palliative care for a few months now, I know that it’s good to bring some things to a closure, completion, clarification and healing. My heroes live happier lives as a result, some far longer than their doctors predicted. And you know what? Our adventures in life will remain unfinished at some point anyway, we just have to accept that. Even in the unfinished there is joy, kindness, laughter and glittering crystals of humanity.
