ZEN AND THE ART OF BICYCLE RIDING

Dear friends and family,

After years of daydreaming and many months of preparation it looks my bucket list may soon be shorter by one and the long anticipated bike ride across the good old US of A will become a reality.

This 4,232 mile journey will start in Astoria, Oregon on May 7th. I will be following what is known as the Transamerica North route. My dad and I will drive up on the 5th, spend another day goofing off and then the following day Pops will kick my pooper and the bike outta the car and vanish. I will spend the first two days pedaling south along the Oregon coast before turning inland. This route will take me through Oregon and into Northern Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky and Virginia, where I will take my last few pedal strokes arriving in Yorktown sometime in early August. At least that's how it all plays out from my living room couch.

I will be doing this ride alone. Some of you, ok, many of you have questioned my sanity about this. But as Sheldon Cooper in the TV show Big Bang Theory has said, "I am not crazy, my parents had me tested." In all honesty there is a method behind my alleged madness and this methodology contains some very personal components that I wish to hold close to the vest for the time being. I hope you can appreciate my feelings about this. Enough said.

The Balcony blog site you are reading now will undergo a major remodel immediately after I post this piece and transform into my trip diary, new name and all. When I figure out what that name is I will let you know but the site address will not change. It is my intention to stay as current as possible and share with you my stories and experiences as I go along, complete with pictures and an occasional video clip. For you iPhone and iPad folks, I will also be using an app called "trackmytour." It is free and will allow you to follow my progress near live time by GPS waypoints and mapping software. In addition, anyone can go to www.trackmytour.com, click on "tours in progress", find mine and go from there. It has the same info. If you get the urge to communicate with me, texting will be your best bet. I will do my best to stay in touch as much as my situation allows. If for some bizarre reason you feel overly encumbered with the need to see my ugly puss live, I will have a laptop equipped with Skype. I promise to put down my medical marijuana and give it a shot.

I will be riding a bicycle specifically built for long trips, heavy cargo and lots of abuse. It is actually called the, "Long Haul Trucker." Think modern day version of the good old, indestructible Schwinn Varsity bike from the 1970s. I will be carrying everything I need(I think) on my bike in front and back panniers, front and rear rack packs, a saddle bag, a front bar storage box and a handlebar bag. Anything that doesn't fit after that will buddy up with a bungee cord and climb aboard. I estimate the gear will weigh in at 40 to 45 pounds. The bike with all its after market attachments is roughly 40 lbs and the old geezer pushing the pedals currently tips the scales at 230 lbs. What we will have here folks is a 315 lb, two wheel RV that will strike fear into any Mini Cooper that wants to bump ugly.

 

I will have a GPS equipped computer on the front handlebar that will provide me with continuous information about time, speed, altitude, distance, temperature and heart rate. An emergency GPS communicator will be affixed to the back of the bike in case the poo poo meets the oscillator, and of course all the other mainstream gadgets such as an  iPhone, an iTouch, a shuffle, a GoPro camera, a digital camera and a laptop computer. I will also have an 800 lumen helmet light that is roughly as bright as a car headlight.

My accommodations will be varied. Occasionally I will be staying with host families from a touring website. Other times I will be camping out or staying in motels, city parks, churches and maybe even Fire stations, where my retired law enforcement ID ought to get me a shower and a meal. I couldn't fit my California King Posturepedic mattress on the bike but REI has graciously allowed me to spend a small fortune in their store, so I have the lightest, best quality gear a ton of money can buy!

I fully expect that whisky and Top Ramen will satisfy all my nutritional needs but just to be safe I will carry an assortment of items such as oatmeal, tuna, peanut butter, sports bars, nuts and enough Motrin to put down a horse. Home cooked meals will be a nice luxury at the host family sites, but for the most part I will depend on grocery stores, convenient stores, restaurants and fast food joints. I will likely return addicted to MSG.

Why am I doing this. Good question. A long time ago I watched the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind. During a dinner scene with his family, Richard Dryfuss began fashioning his mashed potatoes into a form. A specific form. He didn't know quite why he was doing it  at the time, but he felt a compelling need none the less. A beckoning. I may not be getting ready to meet with aliens from outer space but there is now and has been for several years a tug at my soul to do this. Maybe there is something out there I need to experience, someone I need to meet, something that will happen perhaps. I don't know. We shall see. In any case, I do feel confident that I will have the opportunity to meet a wide variety of people from different stations in life. I am very interested in their stories, lifestyles and perspectives and I hope to share some with you.

I know some of you have expressed concerns about my safety once I hit the open roads.Some of this centers around the possibility that the emperor Obama may seize the opportunity to drone strike me into a burgundy colored splat first chance he gets! I am way ahead of him. At the very instant I leave Astoria, several hundred Mike Jones look a like decoys will deploy, depart and disperse from cities all across the fruited plains and head off in all directions. Am I really leaving from Oregon?
Hummmmmmmm........

To sum it up, I will borrow lyrics from the song "Netherlands" by the late Dan Fogleberg;
                 
                 Once in a vision I came to some woods,
                 And stood at the fork in a road.
                 My choices were clear, but I froze with the fear,
                 Of not knowing which way to go..............

                One road was simple, acceptance of life,
                The other road offered sweet peace.
                When I made my decision,
                My vision became my release..................



All the best,

Mike

 

GIRLS, GIRL, GIRLS

A recent news story out of somewhere featured a gaggle of  pseudo celebrity woman speaking into a camera, issuing a fallacious dictum to all that they prefer the word "bossy" be removed from the English language. Well maybe not the whole language per se, just the part of the English language that contains adjectives describing the behavior of certain woman, who are, apparently, bossy. The term "bossy" as explained by these obviously bossy woman, does irreparable harm to a little girls self esteem when she is described as such in the school yard or at home and makes it more difficult for her to blossom into womanhood unfettered by the stigma of being considered bossy. Got that? So from this point on, under direct order from a few bossy woman, the word bossy is not to be used in conjunction with them or any other females who may be bossy. Is it just me or do they sound really bossy?

My personal reaction to this story was five solid minutes of hysterical laughter, followed by a quick trip to the john so as not to risk a leak resulting from repeated abdominal convulsions related to said laughter. And then refection.

Stories like this interest me because my formative years from which I developed my views about the fairer sex is a story book filled with events and emotional experiences that under most other circumstances would have turned me sour on the whole concept of woman, particularly bossy woman. It was ugly from the get go.........

In Kindergarten my attempt to impress a cute little brunette sitting on the edge of the playground resulted in my free fall from a play structure and a surgically re attached tongue. My parents were temporarily delighted when the surgeon advised them I may not regain the ability to talk, however we all know how that turned out.

In the 3rd grade, I must have gotten really cute because two girls from my class could not keep themselves from constantly throwing redwood bark at me every time we were in the playground. One day I decided to return fire and wouldn't you know it, I hit one of the girls center mass between her running lights. I had a wicked arm back then. This particular little girl immediately broke out into tears and ran screaming to the yard duty teacher, who grabbed me by the ear and drug me to the principals office. My side of the story carried no weight and I was disciplined.

In addition to a good arm, I could run and in the 4th grade the annual foot race for fastest kid pitted myself and a girl in the finals. The winner got a Humazoo, a gift from our teacher who also owned a music store. It was a highly coveted prize and the owner of a Humazoo was worshipped by all. I edged out the girl and won the race. Seconds later, and much to my amazement, the girl who I had just out ran was bawling her brains out, declaring between gulps of wet air that I had somehow cheated. The teacher, Humazoo in hand, walked over to the crying girl and handed her my prize! He then approached me and said he would bring another for me later. WTF? I was starting to sense a pattern here.

6th grade rolled around and I had the unpleasant experience of being a straight A student with two other girls, Ramona and Colleen( I will never forget their names as long as I live). They spent the better part of every school day working themselves into the good graces of the teacher so when it came time for the job of teacher's assistants to help with a large project, guess who was the odd man out? Yup. At project's end, R and C walked up to me and accused me of falsifying my work, a suspicion they brought to the attention of the teacher with tremendous conspiratorial vigor. I found myself being treated  as a guilty man by the teacher until I was able to prove my innocence. Ramona and Colleen had gone out of their way to try to destroy my reputation for no other reason than to diminish me in the eyes of the teacher. I began to dislike the whole concept of girls.

It happened on a rainy day in the 7th grade. The piece de resistance. The incident that would set in motion years of anger and distrust of females. Alice Caldwell was her name. A pot smoking hippie with an attitude. Up until this particular day I had never spoken with her. She and I were from different planets and I assumed that we were mutually fine with that. I assumed wrong. Those that know me well know I am extremely punctual. Being late for anything is unacceptable and on this rainy day something caused me to get to the classroom very near the tardy bell, but I made it. Or so I thought. For some unexplainable reason, Alice Caldwell decided to run up and hold the door shut so I could not get in. It was pouring rain, I was soaking wet and I was stressed by my potential tardiness. A friend motioned for me to run around the classroom and come in the other door, which I tried, except Alice had run straight across and held that door shut also. The teacher meanwhile, Mrs Fireman, was going out of her way to pretend that she didn't notice this whole ongoing incident, dutifully keeping her head down on some papers at her desk. I became frantic and angry. I had no idea why this dope head would suddenly decide to inject herself into my business. I ran like hell to the original door and barely got there before her. I opened the door and walked inside a few feet on the wet tiles at which time Alice, furious that she failed to make me tardy, shoved me with both hands, full force into my chest. My feet slipped out from under me and I went backward, head first into the kitchen counter area, smacking my head into the corner of the sink before hitting the ground with a thud. I placed my hand on my head where I hit the sink and saw blood all over it. My friends were all standing nearby, stunned and amazed at what just happened. Mrs. Fireman was still pretending not to notice. That was the last straw for me.

I got up and clocked her with a left hook. Alice went to the ground. The tears started just seconds later. Mrs. Fireman saw that. Poor Alice was taken to the nurse for treatment. I was bloody from a head laceration but my treatment wasn't medical and wasn't pleasant. I was dragged into the administration office. My dad was contacted by phone and he arrived shortly after. In the hallway I spelled out exactly what happened to my father and he knew the truth when he heard it. The school employees were a different story however. The principle, vice-principle, my dad and I all gathered in a small conference room. Neither school official was interested in my side of the story, but we were all regaled with Alice's version of the events and it was all pure fiction. They told me it served no purpose of ask others what happened because under no circumstances are boys ever to hit girls. Ever.

I was suspended for a week. It stayed with me for years. I couldn't understand what was wrong with females and why they got away with whatever they wanted. The playing field was nowhere near level and I couldn't get anyone to explain to me why. I came to completely distrust woman and I developed a seriously adverse reaction to girls crying when ever things didn't go their way. I kept these feelings for many years

Ironically I was eventually healed by my relationships with woman, both platonic and romantic. I came to realize that woman are much more complicated then men, and girls growing up in a environment with umpteen pre-conceptions and social pressures have to deal with them in ways that are completely alien to boys at the same periods in their development. Girls were forced to use subterfuge and passive aggressive formulas in order to survive in what was then a male dominated culture, and it worked. At times they had to be bossy, they had to assert control for fear of losing it and when control through command was not available due to a dominant male or males, their only resource remaining was the more Wiley and subversive tactics that I was so privileged to have experienced in all its forms as a child.

I have experienced bossy woman my whole life and I love them. I see the passive aggressive side and I love them still. I actually admire woman now. Their complex and intricate brains are receptors of vastly more nuanced and subtle input then any male will ever experience. They feel deeper and stronger, they shoulder loads that would crumple a grown man and they willingly allow us to formulate preconceptions about what we think they should look like. Wow. I will never complain about being male.............

So a few angry woman want to censor us. Have at it ladies.........just don't cry about it!