My Weekend...

This week I was maybe a little foolish in my physical exertions. I got an email from Josh Chambers on Wednesday saying Jordan Singleton and his wife were living at his parents this summer before going to med school in Wisconsin. He was going out of town this coming week and Jordan was leaving soon after, and he wanted to get together for lunch. So, Thursday afternoon I was sitting around doing nothing and decided to look up the UTA routes to see how far north I could get on my bus pass. Turns out there was a commuter bus that runs from the train in Ogden to Brigham City. I figured I could ride my bike over Sardine Canyon, so I immediately packed my bag and dashed out the door. I only had about seven minutes to ride from my place down to the Salt Lake station on 6th west, but surprisingly the lights almost all went in my favor and I made the train.

The Frontrunner takes about an hour to go from Salt Lake to Ogden. From there the bus took like an hour to get from Ogden to the intersection of 11th South and Main in Brigham City. That's the light you never make when coming down out of the canyon on the way to I-15. I got off of the bus at about 3:Something in the afternoon. It didn't take me a really long time to figure out that I might have been a little foolish to go at this time. It was very hot, about 93 degrees, and I probably didn't have enough water in my bottle. It was a hard ride.

By the time I got to the Stake Center Hill in Millville I'd had it, and I walked up it. When I got to the top I went over to Jordan's parents house. Jordan was in and we sat around and talked all evening while he worked on a commercial appraisal for his dad. His dad is an appraiser. Anyway I spoke and spoke and spoke. It's weird for me. Jordan is actually becoming pretty good with probing questions. He was a dual major in psych and philosophy, and I think the idea is that he's going to med school to do psychiatry. It's kind of funny because he didn't believe in it at all when we were kids. I remember waking up in the night once when we were having a sleepover at his house when we were kids. I was having a small panic attack and was getting ready to go home. He was angry, (this was what happened about every time I slept over in those days), and he said, "It's all in your head!" It's interesting to see him choose this line of work.

Anyway, we ended up playing Wii (my first time) till like 1:00AM, then made plans to go to lunch with Josh the next day, and I went home. Jordan can be a little ADD, and I couldn't get a hold of him Friday and I had his cell phone number down wrong. I didn't know Josh's number, and I didn't think to simply look his law offices number in the book. So, instead I spent the day working on that old Peugeot that I'm converting to a single speed. I actually got it more or less running, but then I decided to true the back tire. A spoke broke and that ended the project till I can get some new ones. After that I spent a few hours working on cleaning out the trench in yard where I shall soon lay the foundation for the rock wall I'm going to try to finish before going back to school. So that was good, but involved more dehydration and very hot weather.

The slept poorly that night and decided in the morning that sooner was better than later for riding home. I had to pick my Mom and Dad up at the airport at about 8:30PM, and I was thinking of sticking around till the afternoon to see of Jordan and Josh would want to get together, but instead I just left. I rode out around 9:15, and found that Sardine Canyon is easier from the Cache Valley side. You can see on the elevation graph on the route map that you descend more than you climb when going from Cache to Brigham.

Anyway, I figured on catching the bus back at that intersection, but when I arrived I was feeling pretty good. I could ride on down highway 89 I thought. I would have to sit around for 45 mins if I waited for the bus there. Why not ride on to the next stop, then the next if I was ahead of the schedule. So I did, and eventually I was thinking, "I could just ride into Ogden to the station."

About the south side of Willard I lost it. I was done, and I guessed that the bus should be coming soon. The stops were a few miles apart now, and I stopped and waited at a couple before going on. It was too hot and I was too sore to stand in the open on the side of the highway. My legs started cramping when I did. In my head, also, was a voice saying, "Ride on. Ride on. Be a man. Make some progress. It's only about 10 miles to go." I was thinking about riding with my Dad when I was a kid. We'd be dying, but he rode on and on. I always thought of rides in increments, but for him it seemed to be binary. Either you were done or you weren't, and you weren't done until you reached your destination. So he'd ride on, and on, and on.

So I was riding on, and was in between two bus stops in Harrisville when the bus passed.

I stopped at a Chevron and lay on the grass under a tree until my heart stopped racing. When I got up I was sore all over, so I finished my water bottle and went in to refill it, then got back on my bike and rode. I play these tricks on my mind when I'm riding. I say, "Man, I'm tired, but I can make it to that mile marker up there. Then I'll decided whether to stop and rest." When I reach that point I convince myself that I'm fine, that in fact I'm getting a second wind. So with that renewed energy I choose the next mile marker. I tried doing that with the stop lights, which in Harrisville and North Ogden are relatively far apart, but my body kept betraying my mind. I was done, and no manner of mind trick was going to change it. But I didn't have a choice so I kept going.

I was feeling kind of foolish. Somewhere there's a picture of Peter, Dad, and I in Roy getting back on our bikes. I was probably like ten. That day we rode all the way from home to Salt Lake. I'd managed that at ten, and here I was, almost thirty and dragging myself into Ogden. It felt a little pitiful. But I got there.

I had forty-five minutes until the next train left so I went into a gas station Burger King. I figured I could buy some food and wait in the air conditioning. I should have known better than to choose Burger King. I don't know if I've ever enjoyed anything I've bought there. I bought a hamburger, a chicken sandwich, and a small chocolate shake from the value menu, and went to sit down and watch CNN on the wall TV. I got through the shake and it gave me a little stomach ache. I probably consumed it too fast. But I'd bought the sandwiches and felt obligated to eat them. I started with the hamburger. I think it was about 30% bun, 10% meat, 1% cheese, and 59% mustard (0% ketchup). It oozed out all over the place, and eating it was unpleasant. The stomach ache grew. The chicken sandwich was similarly comprised, but substitute mayo for mustard. I made it half way through and knew I couldn't take anymore. I imagined I was throwing two quarters away as I all went in the garbage. It gave me a twinge of guilt, but it was a fair price not to have to keep eating.

Anyway, I got on the train and went home after that, but I'm bored of the relation of this story. So that's all you get.

This Week's Ride...

So, durring the week I decied I was going to do at least one big ride or hike per week. So my ride for this week was going to be to go up Emigration Canyon. I went yesterday (Saturday), and all the way up to the UofU campus I was wondering if this was a good idea. I thought, maybe I'll take it in steps. Today I'll ride to the top of campus. Next time I'll ride to the mouth of the canyon. Next time I'll bla, bla, bla... You get it. Anyway, that is usual for me, to feel doubtful as I begin. Then I ignore that and say, I'll just go till I can't anymore and see where that gets me.

I continued on up the canyon at a fair clip, but there were people in spandex passing me pretty regularly. "Oh," I thought, "to be a person in spandex. To have slightly less air resistance." Ok, not really, but I was thinking how nice it would be to be on a road bike and have less resistance on the ground. But I carried on.

Eventually my lower back got so sore that I had to stop for a moment and stretch. As I was doing that one of the few people in spandex that I had passed passed me again. When I got back on the bike and started to ride again I approached him relatively quickly and overtook him. As I passed him by and looked at him as I went I began to feel a little sorry for him. He looked about 40, and was well rounded. He was riding a flatbar Trek roadbike, and looked uncomfortable in his spandex. I figured he'd been sold the whole getup and had chosen the flatbar because he wasn't quite sure he could commit himself to a full dropbar road bike self. He was buying the dream of being fit, but probably knew a comfort bike was more his speed. Its the struggle between the desire for the image of fitness and the reality of the need for better health.

I knew from how easily I'd passed him that he probably had felt bad when I had gone around him before and was pushing to get back where he thought he belonged, in front of me. After all, he'd bought spandex, and a relatively expensive bike. He wasn't that old. Being in front of me with my baggy shorts and my fat tired mtn. bike would prove it, would justify the purchase. So when I passed him again I knew I was disheartening him. But it would be just silly to fall back because of this, and I put it out of my head as I went on.

Originally I had planned to ride to the first switchback. I thought it was a reasonable distance for me. But I was running out of juice. I was most of the way through Purple, the second album by Stone Temple Pilots, and I decided I'd ride to the end of the album. So I continued on for three songs, flagging, and when the fourth began I thought, "That's it. I'm done." (I'd misremembered how many songs there were.) So I stopped, and rested for a moment while I fought myself over turning around. Eventually I decided to go on. I rode for about a hundred yards and the trees opened up and I found myself at the switchback. I'd almost turned back when I was about a block away.

I got off there and sat on a concrete guard and drank some water, and thought about my near failure. It made me a little ashamed of myself and raised my ire. At that moment the well rounded 40 year old in spandex passed with a triumphant gloat in his eyes. "Good for him," I thought. "And shame on me." I decided that I would ride on. After a couple of minutes I got back on my bike and started on my way up.

Here the shoulder widened and so did the view. More people in spandex passed me now, most of them spindly tall guys about my age on very expensive bikes. There were a few women too. One of them I thought was a guy, when I saw her arms and shoulders (they were bigger than most of the guys I'd seen riding), then I saw her breasts. She was scary.

The view was really nice at this point in the canyon. All of the sudden you are above the bottom of it and you can see back down toward the valley, and how and high you have come.

I continued on for a couple of miles, and at one point the well rounded fellow passed me coming down, wearing a satisfied smile. Eventually my second wind was running out and I saw a summit, hoping it was the top, and as I rode up and over it, it was. There was a scenic pull off and about twenty five or thirty bikers were standing around smiling and chatting with each other and the other members of their parties. I smiled and looked out at the reservoir below, and then I turned around and rode down.

I ran a couple of errands in town on the way home, and when I put my route into Bikely it came out at about 30 miles. I'd planned on doing 22. It was a very nice way to spend a Saturday morning.

A Ride Through the Mountains

I've been going home to Cache Valley to help my parents out for a few days a week. They've been watching my sister Miriam's four boys while Miriam, Nathan, and the girls move from Florida to Alabama. It's been a little rough on Mom and Dad. If they could institute a mandatory four hour nap for the boys I think they'd have done it on the second or third day. It doesn't have to be as hard as it has been, (Abe, you know who you are), but it has, and I end up running interference.

Anyway, I got this brilliant idea that I'd ride my bike there and back to keep from paying $4+ a gallon. I wasn't about to try riding all the way, at least not on my first time, so I planned rather to ride the Frontrunner to Ogden then ride up one of the canyons and go through Liberty, over the mountain and down to Avon where I'd have someone come pick me up. Well it so happened that Mike Forsberg was going up the day I intended so I hitched a ride with him and spent the 3rd (yea USU fireworks show, ((not really, (((fireworks don't appeal to me like they did when I was a kid))) )) ) and the fourth (yea getting second degree burns from a blow torch ((not really, (((burns don't appeal to me like they did when I was a kid, ((((reference posterior of right hand)))) ))) )) ) (too many parentheses?) up there.

So at 3:30 in the afternoon on the 5th, Dad dropped me off in Avon. I took my bike out of the trunk and started to ride up state road 162. I'd ridden it once when I was a little kid on a road bike, which seems insane to me now. Maybe it was graded then, but even on a mountain bike, with cantilever brakes and a front shock I was sometimes worried a little.

One of my goals this summer, since I don't have a whole lot to do for school, is to ride my bike and hike a lot, and to take a lot of pictures that I can post of Panoramio for Google Earth. Anyway, by the time I got to the top of the pass, which is by far the most senic part of the ride, I was too tired and sunburnned to really care about photos. Anyway the top is really nice, and you should give the ride a try sometime. The wild flowers were just starting to wilt, and there are these long rolling meadows full of them. It looks like Switzerland. Its really very beautiful.

The descent was kind of scary. It goes down into Liberty pretty quickly. The terrifying part was how people in ATV's race up it. That sucks too because if you didn't bring enough water, as I didn't, the inside of your throat gets coated in dust. It's two or three inches deep in a couple of places. Also there were a couple partial washouts on the switchbacks on the road. There were several 4-wheel drive vehicles on the road on both sides, and strangely enough I saw about three or four passenger cars. I pity their parts.

I rode through Liberty and Eden, around Pineview Reservoir, and down Ogden Canyon. Even though I've been riding around town a fair amount, it hasn't built up that much tolerance to the effects of spending hours straddling a bike seat. By this time my crotch hurt. Alot. Anyway, I foolishly followed the map on Google rather than the address of the train station and common sense. When I hit North Ogden I knew something fishy was happening. I stopped and asked a guy spraying weeds in his driveway. The station was something more than 24 blocks the other way. I think Google was going by county road numbers or something.

The guy was super nice. When I asked him if I could fill my water bottle from his hose he went in and got me a bottled water. Looking like one of those bums who ride around on thriftstore mt. bikes with a Colt 45 oz. I rode the last couple miles to the station. I was very tired and covered in dust and grime. I boarded the train, strapped my bike in and plugged my earphones into my head. I was pretty much done for the day.

The worst part came afterward though. We were about to pull into the Salt Lake station when this girl came down the aisle and sat across from me. She looked at me and I kind of tried to smile. She started talking to me but I was too tired to want to take my earphones out, and I couldn't really make out what she was saying. So I just nodded a little, smiled and said, "Umm." Then she kept talking and from her tone I could tell she was asking me something. I'd have to take my earphones out.

When I did she started telling me about her troubles. She said she was so stressed out she felt like she was going to lose her baby, (she looked about 18, rundown and dressed poorly). Her husband had got hurt at work and had burns from his fingers to his bicep, and he couldn't work anymore, so they were moving in with her parents. The way she said it made it obvious it was the last thing she wanted to do. What was worse was that her husband was super depressed now because he didn't feel like he was helping his family. There seemed to be the implication the way she said it that he felt like they'd be better off without him. So she was starting to cry, wiping tears and holding her stomach with one hand, and I knew it was my turn to speak, to make her feel better.

And I couldn't. I was so tired that I decided not to muster up the courage to offer anything real by way of advice, or simply commiserating or sharing her feeling like a good human would do. Instead I said in a bland voice, "Things will work out." And then I looked away uncomfortably, in a way that would make her feel that I was embarrassed by her tears and her forwardness in telling me about her problems. It worked. She left me alone after that and a moment later I got my bike and I transferred over to the Trax.

The whole way home, riding the Trax then walking my past the reflecting pond and all the fountains at Temple Square and up 2nd Ave, I was thinking of the things I should have said to her, the experiences I should have shared, and feeling bad about it all. What bothers me is that this is becoming a pattern with me. Somewhere along the line I was offered some human contact and I said no. The next time it was easier to ignore, and the next, and the next. And now I've become one of those people who are shut off from everyone. I was thinking about my picture on my profile. The older one was monochromatic. No color. This newer one is even more honest. I look a little like a ghost.

So anyway, I've been trying a little to change that. A little at a time. I hope one day to be the type of person who would give that girl whatever she needed, the type that would make her feel better.