Reflections on a Bike Ride
The thrill of riding my bike begins with the anticipation as I change into my cycling clothes. I bound out the door and down the back steps toward the garage, feeling excitement at the touch of sun on my face, the wind in my hair, knowing that I am in for a holistic experience that enlivens every part of me: the sensual, emotional, physical, spiritual, and the intellectual. I cannot know what unique moments I will encounter, but I am certain they will include some mix of reverie, enlightenment, connection, satisfaction, challenge, exertion, joy, delight, pleasure, and discovery.
Automatically, I reach for the 12-speed road bike, wanting to satisfy my need for speed. I smile as I put my thumb to the tires and note that they are sufficiently inflated. Donning helmet, gloves, and fanny pack with water bottles, I walk my wheels to the edge of the street. There I lightly hop aboard, slide my left shoe into the toe clip, press down on the right pedal, and grin as I take flight.
I zip down my street, slow through the stop sign, and down the next block, enjoying the rhythm of my pedals, feeling the shift in my breath and heartbeat. Hanging a right onto Occoquan Road, I queue up in the traffic lined at the red light at Horner Road. Slightly warmed up, I stretch while I wait for the light to change, paying most attention to my upper torso and arms, remembering that cycling tends to close this area, and I need to make sure I counteract it to avoid another injury.
Having ridden this route perhaps 200 times in the past year, I know the sequence of the traffic light well, and my left foot is on the pedal before the light changes to green. As the surge of traffic rolls forward like a wave, I am quickly passed by the four-wheeled flow, and for a moment my mind touches on the thought that I am not at all nervous in this rush. Keenly aware, yes, but not afraid like I was 12 months ago. In that thought I see a metaphor for the rest of my life.
The bank of cars passes and I have a stretch of Occoquan road to myself. Still hugging the shoulder for safety and good habit, I slide into 12th gear, press hard on the pedals, and take off. Remarkably, happily, the light at Rt. 1 turns green as I approach the intersection, and I sail on through it and start up the short hill on the other side. Immediately, I notice how my ability has slackened over the winter; it takes more effort to climb the hill than it did last fall. I downshift to 6th as my momentum slows, feeling a little tired at the crest of the hill, but there mustering the energy to make the descent as thrilling as I can.
Slipping back into 12th gear, I stand on the pedals for a few strokes, then hunker down and pedal as fast as I can down the hill on Dawson Beach Road. The warm rays of the late day's sun on my skin are rippled by the coolness of the wind: nature's wind, and the apparent wind I create with my body and my machine. The barely bearable "lightness of being" swells within me, and I heed the impulse to cry out, "YES!" This primordial prayer of thanksgiving rises from my chest and into the wind- the breath of the Universe. Crude and unadorned, it flies direct from my core and joins the breath of the Universe, where, I am certain, it is received with the same Grace as any elegant psalm.
© 2007 Shay Seaborne. All rights reserved.
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