Today marks the first full week of the Ride for GRUB challenge. I am starting two months late into the year, so that means I will need to ride an average of 50 miles each week to meet my goal of 2021. But you know how it is—some weeks will be better than others. Some weeks I may be tired, or sick, or out of town, or the weather might be crappy, so I am actually hoping to work up to riding 70 miles most weeks to cover the shortfall. But I am just starting out, and I don’t want to overdo it this first month, so I figure to aim for the 50 each week.
All of which is to explain my mood this morning when I set out on my ride. A cold front had moved in during the night, and there was a sharp wind blowing from the south. I layered up in tights, a winter jersey, and full fingered cycling gloves, and though it cut the chill, it would do nothing to reduce the labor of the ride.
I have lived all of my life in windy places. I have also ridden my bike in that same wind. So I knew it was no good feeling sorry for myself—I needed to make my goal of 50 miles, but the only thing self-pity would change about the situation is make me feel more miserable. Even so, after I changed into my riding kit, I sat in the chair for a good hour, making excuses for why I didn’t need to/shouldn’t go: My knee is bothering me a little, my shoulder, my hip; I could take a rest day; 41 miles in the first week was pretty good—good enough—danged good for the first week.
All the while I stared out the window at the falling live oak leaves flying around like flocks of small, panicked birds.
Finally, I just went. I was wearing my cycling glasses, which I haven’t done in a while because the prescription insert has not been updated since 2007 (I shit you not). After a few cold, windy, tear-inducing rides this spring while wearing my regular prescription sunglasses, I decided to update the insert so I could have the better wind coverage from the cycling glasses. But the insert had to be sent off to Dallas and has yet to return, and so I was riding tearless, but half-blind. I figured that was some kind of metaphor, and somewhere between 19th Street and Glenna Goodacre Drive, while I was trying to figure out “metaphor for what?”, I accepted my fate, geared down, and settled into the task.
I rode.
I reminded myself that my friend Jill used to say, “Wind is a training tool.”
I reminded myself that I have always said, “This is why God invented gears.”
I reminded myself that physics says as long as I keep pedaling I won’t fall over.
I thought about how lucky it is that the particular earworm that is stuck in my head right now is a country music song, the refrain of which is “Hold the door/say please/say thank you/something something something/‘cause bitterness will keep you from flying/always stay humble and kind.” There are worse earworms to have.
I rode downtown. Specifically, it was my intent to get up the nerve to ride under the Loop 289 overpass on Broadway. I was looking for a safe way to cross over to the Canyon Lakes area, which is a beautiful place to ride. In years past, I have always ridden from my house down Indiana Street, over to the access road from which you can turn into Buddy Holly Park and Lake 1. But dang it, every single time I ride down Indiana, there is this little, yappy yard dog that chases me. And I am sick and tired of it. Sick. And. Tired. So I was looking for a different route.
But the underpass on Broadway has always made me nervous—it slopes down into darkness, and I worry that a car coming over the top might not see me. It was Sunday, though, and traffic should be light, so I thought it would be a good day to check it out.
Downtown itself was deserted and lonely. On the edge of it, where it turns industrial, I passed an abandoned building with a metal sign torn in half and clanging in the wind. All the streets in that part were bricked and bumpy, and my sore shoulder got more so. And when I reached the part of Broadway that drops down under the Loop, I felt as if I was plunging into the empty, gaping maw of a great whale and feared I might never return to the light of day...
Haha! But of course I did! The light of day was just on the other side! And there too was a particular mural I have always wanted to photograph, so that got me pretty excited, maw of the whale notwithstanding:
On the return, I decided to ride by the new Buddy Holly Center for the Arts: