November 1, 2020: A Year in Retrospect

 Once again it's November and the cold (it's currently 35 degrees F outside, 19 F with the very strong wind chill blasting around the eastern border of Minnesota and Wisconsin as I write this. But it's about 2:30pm in the afternoon, and the coffee shop is warm and inviting, the paper coffee cup in my hand is warming up my frozen bones, and I'm riding in November, so zero complaints. 

I'm sitting in Dunn Brothers in the river valley on the Wisconsin side, with Sunshine, my 2008 Suzuki Bandit 1250s, my trusted ride, sitting quietly out front. 

The ride here was extremely cold, even with seven layers on. I still don't have heated gloves, gear, or grips, any or all of which would have made the ride a bit less bone chilling, but the way I figure it, if it's that cold that I need that kind of gear to just stay warm enough to ride, it's probably below my "safety temp" of 34 degrees F anyway, a point at which the tires on my bike simply won't stay warm enough to allow me very much twisty fun. My rule of thumb since a cold-temperature lowside my first year of riding remains simply: cold street rubber = plastic tires = no sticky sticky = bad outcomes.

But even with adherence to that safety temperature, I still felt Sunshine's back wheel slide and start coming around as we hit a big stray patch of ice left in the middle of a rural Wisconsin roundabout on the way down here. No doubt a leftover from the half foot of snow that blanketed Minnesota and Wisconsin about 12 days ago. A bummer, but not nearly as scary as it used to be for me.

I'm a moderately confident rider now, having put on nearly 10,000 miles since March 4 and about 25,000 since I started riding 3 years ago. These days, whenever she slides in a turn like that because of surface or traction issues, I'm well practiced.  I just clutched in immediately and gently eased the bike up from the angle I had her set. Even if she doesn't stand up because the physics won't allow it, at least by rearranging my center of gravity and releasing any pressure on the back wheel, she'll maintain her (sometimes severe) angle without flattening out any more. Then it's just a matter of waiting for the back wheel to catch solid ground again, which hopefully happens (i.e. has thus far happened :-) before we slide out of the other side of the corner.

So it's been an entire year of riding, including several thousand miles with a new motorcycle club that I joined in March, but this is my first and likely only blog entry of 2020. So yeah...

I've honestly had a lot to say about a lot of things happening this year, but because I have maintained (and continue to maintain) a very unpopular line among the fearful heard around me, I have held my thoughts back from this forum. 

I intended this blog to be a place where I write about my love of travel by motorcycle and the personal and transforming effects of movement in unique ways. I did not want it to be about politics or hidden agendas or any of that bullshit. But as it goes, this worldwide epidemic of fear and lies that has taken over is as much or moreso about a failure of human beings on an individual and personal level than it is a about bullshit polities or billionaire agendas.

And so here goes ... 

To begin with, I guess I just assumed everybody understood that all politicians LIE. That mainstream media LIES. That every one of the international industrial complexes, whether industrial, military, pharmaceutical, food, or petroleum, LIES. I just assumed that everybody who walks the planet takes these facts for granted and would never allow their freedom and sanity and rationality to be compromised in any major way by any of these external entity-promoted lies. 

I was wrong.

Let's get this clear. I absolutely love America and what it represents and the freedoms it affords us as Americans, but this has been a challenging time for Americans who want to see America great again. Instead, it seems like my beloved free America (along with most of the 'free' world) has turned into a Nazi-like interment camp, using state-sponsored media and political and billionaire agendas to turn neighbor against neighbor, cultivating suspicion and fear at absolutely every level.

Basically, it's divide and conquer. This is not the America I love. 

I mean, it still is America, but I am so very disappointed by the behavior of most of my fellow Americans. 

I understand if citizens of other less-free countries capitulate to state pressures, however irrational. They don't cultivate courage like we do. They don't cultivate free thinking like we do. I understand if those citizens cower from their tyrannical ruling monarchies when given "marching orders", Given abject capitulation versus the risk of certain torture, death or imprisonment, what choice do they have?  

But this is America! 

What happened to American free thinking? To American courage? To American rationality when facing outside pressure, real or imagined? Where did personal accountability go? Accountability for one's own physical body and health and wellbeing? And what happened to American curiosity? Our desire to get to the bottom of any riddle and solve it. More importantly, what happened our American will to uncover and champion the truth at any expense, especially over any purveyors of questionable information, be they foreign or domestic..?

I found myself asking these questions from the back of my motorcycle as I rode through abandoned roads filled with putrid clouds of human insanity and fear over the past year. And I still have all these same questions as the year 2020 now comes to a close, and precious few answers.

The coffee shop that Sunshine was parked in front of in my previous post from last November was burned to the ground during the riots. I have ridden all the way into neighboring Wisconsin on almost every ride this year, a minimum of an hour long ride one way. Why? Simply because the supreme court in Wisconsin was one of the only state courts brave enough to shutdown the abuse of emergency powers by its own governor. Accordingly, I can walk into nearly any shop here without worrying about donning a stupid and pointless face mask. Wisconsin, at least the areas of Wisconsin that I now frequent, is still "free America". There are precious few areas of the country left that can make that claim.

If you read this, and you are American, I implore you to take time to consider what that really means. 

Consider the sacrifices and hurdles that were overcome in order for the constitution of this great country to have been inked by great thinkers, men with great hearts and even greater minds, who really crafted an inspired document describing what a country of free citizens could actually be like. 

Now consider how much animosity and division you have allowed into your heart and mind, to be cultivated like a fast-growing cancer by manipulative sources you consider to be "true". Is it really truth you're hearing and believing?

America was founded upon some very basic human values, principally Truth (i.e. real truth), alongside integrity, equality, decency, accountability, compassion, tolerance. None of these values seek to divide.

If the truth that you are dialed into, religious, political, medical, personal, spiritual, or otherwise, whether as a result of believing in this current worldwide stream of bullshit or from any other religious, media, parental, peer, or personal source in your life, past or present, ...  if any truth you believe in results in you having to maintain an "us versus them" attitude, IT IS NOT TRUE.

Consider that for a while, and then decide what kind of America you want to live in in the many years to come. 

I wish you a wonderful holiday season and happy new year.

Still November Riding

It's been an unusual winter.

Between bouts of severe cold and snow, it's warmed up enough to bring temperatures just above my "safety line" of 35 degrees F. Below that, I know I've got a limited chance of keeping my tire temperatures warm enough to stay sticky. I've already got one low-side slide in traffic under my belt to prove that. But at 35 F and above, I can usually work the tires laterally as I'm riding the straights, and do enough hard stops and starts and aggressive braking, to warm the rubber up enough to where I have some good measure of control over the bike.

And so I've been hesitating putting the bike into warm storage for the winter.

It's been a tough decision because I know ahead of me lay a long, cold, and snowy winter without any riding, and yet the forecast has continued to have days reaching into the low to mid 30's. As long as there hasn't been too much moisture leaving streets ice/snow covered, I've been out riding, and about 15 of the 24 days this month have been ridable, even if sometimes it's been very hard to keep my body warm at speed.

Last night's cold soak and the freezing rain and snow the previous week have left a slick, glassy "ice sheen" on most of the roadways this morning. Previously snow and rain-moistened leaves collected around the roadways in sometimes impressive patches are de facto ice traps.

Still, I give the frosty alleyway a "kick test" in my riding boots, and I decide it's doable. I mount Sunshine, my Suzuki Bandit 1250S, my favorite bike, and ride to a nearby espresso place.

I take the long route, heading north from home until the sun starts to blaze through the partly cloudy eastern sky, then east and facing the sun, soaking it in and allowing the loosening rays to warm through my many layers, then circling back south and north through the city itself.

Lots of puddles remain stubbornly frozen despite the above-freezing air temps, and the wind and sky tell tales of a coming winter cold soak. Also, no matter what I did this morning, I couldn't keep my fingers warm. The engine itself struggled to put off enough heat to warm up my legs at speed (and gloved fingers at stop lights).

Still, I saw this morning's beautiful orange and blue sunrise on the back of my motorcycle, breathing in the environment and feeling the thundering heartbeat of my bike as my pulse and speed quickened a bit to match it... well... it was awesome, and that's the point.

Freezing Rain, No Snow This Morning...

... so *this* is definitely ...

the last ride of the year.

 :-)

Last Ride of 2019

I've been on Sunshine (my 2008 Suzuki Bandit 1250s) every ridable day possible, dozens of rides the past few weeks between bouts of single-digit weather and several short stretches of snow. Between those days, the thermometer would crawl and claw its way back into the 30's and even low 40's, and I would ride.

I was the only bike on the roads around Minneapolis and St Paul this morning as I carved my way through northeast traffic and out to the eastern river valley one last time, avoiding patches of ice from yesterday's melt and last night's freeze-up, and keeping my body and legs tucked tightly into Sunshine's engined-warmed midsection. The sky even opened up for about an hour and let the bright sun tease me into believing I was warm. It didn't last long, though.

I soon found myself navigating back towards the city, my limbs in the now severe headwind were suffering the cold despite being layered up, and my high-tech Icon winter gloves couldn't keep the icy chill from numbing the tips of my fingers and grip. I head for a safe haven, a warm and welcoming coffee shop near home, not willing to park my friend in the garage again just yet.

With the windchill in the teens and the temperature hovering around 35, though, I believe this will likely be my last ride of 2019. Snow in the forecast tomorrow, 20's and much colder after that. I'd like to keep riding but, because of the severe stretch of cold last week, even Sunshine's powerful fuel-injected 1250cc engine wouldn't stay lit for our first ride yesterday morning. I'm pretty sure this was because the fuel had gelled with the severe cold. I bought some fuel stabilizer and anti-gel additive to pour into her tank, and today she was fine, but I really want to end this riding season on a high note, and so I'm going to call it and give her a well-deserved warm winter's rest in a heated garage up north.

There will be many more adventures to be had in 2020, I'm sure. More roads and places to explore. More time spent in the awesome moving meditation that riding has come to mean for me.

I wish you a safe and joyful holiday season, see you next year.

Days like These

I fired up Sunshine, my Bandit 1250s, this Friday morning and unlike the much frostier mornings this past week, she fired right up and gladly stayed lit, her engine burbling and gulping air with excitement for the early morning ride that was to come.

The Bandit and I rode into the early morning sunrise, dodging questionable city traffic and swelling rush hour pandemonium as everybody seemed in a hurry to try to finish up their work week (myself included) so we could all enjoy the nearly 70-degrees and bright blue skies today.

Such awesome October weather.

I finish my work at a nearby Dunn Brothers in a t-shirt, leaving my insulated riding jacket hanging on the chair next to me - I just want to enjoy the wind on my arms, despite the obvious chill hanging in the air.

I was headed for the music cafe that I usually enjoy for a bit on a Friday, but sadly, it has now been converted into an "egg roll" place, and the music scene seems to have all but died there. Ah well, everything changes. I hope the independent and local musicians I've enjoyed there over the years find an even better venue to call home. And, of course, I'll really enjoy riding around finding it, too. ;-)

Not many days like this left this year...

Life Rider, 'Realized'...

In my many travels this past year, I have had precious little cycle time. I mean, I've probably been on 50+ rides, but they've been necessarily shorter than I would have liked.

Last week, though, an old school friend on a business trip about 300 miles away offers a welcome excuse for a leg stretching ride, something more than "to the gym, from the gym, to the gym, from the gym, ..." The ride down was picture perfect, carving highways and long stretches of double-digit back roads to get to the southern Wisconsin / Illinois border. A few maintenance issues but nothing a quick stop by the parts store for a replacement bolt that had shaken off during the rougher parts of the ride, and a new chain (with an oil change) installed last night by Motorcycle Performance in Madison, since the old chain was starting to make a really bad rattle (picked up a rock..?) with every circuit which I only noticed after I had stripped the bike of its saddle bags and went to park it without a helmet on.

So my friend and his six co-workers and I went to dinner (and watched the Packers lose) and hung out yesterday and this morning, and this afternoon I started my ride back the "long way", intending to ride due west to the Mississippi river valley and then swinging by a tiny town in southwestern Wisconsin to visit my daughter on the ride north from there.

Very much unlike yesterday's long and sunny ride, this afternoon saw the skies in southern Wisconsin turn very moody and dark, and my ride started out in a slow, drizzle that quickly turned into a regular rainstorm. I finally called 'time' about 30 miles from where my younger daughter lives in order to regroup and dry out.

But as I sit and dry out and reflect on the the last hour or so of riding, I realized that at some point, I just forgot that I was actually riding a motorcycle. The movement felt completely natural, as though it was perfectly normal for my body to fly down these beautiful (but wet) Wisconsin two-lanes across fields and farmland at 70+ miles per hour. The means and method became invisible to my mind, and for a good long part of that ride, I was free and just saturated by the experience... wet, glassy roads, cloudy hilltops, saturated helmet, the rain saturating the tops of my legs and jeans, taking in the ride through a rain-soaked visor, all of it... pure experience.

In many ways, I feel like I just started riding again. It feels new somehow, and yet deeply familiar. I think somehow all this thinking about riding has calmed down and now I just ride. Period.

For the rest of this life, I will be on a motorcycle and riding...

Doing the Right Thing

Rode into a perfect 45 degree spring morning, sun filling the ever-blue sky above me, all the trees now leafed out, pine pollen wafting through the air, and buds and flowers and foliage of all kinds just popping.

The dark blue waters in the lakes along my ride reflects all hues of green, white, yellows, and silvery blues, and seem to blur the distinction between earth and sky. It's the kind of day where a half hour of riding seems like it passes by in about 3 minutes.

This ride is heavenly, I think to myself, trying hard to stay focused on the ride and the moment.

My "usual" thoughts these days are heavier than normal.

A few years back, I promised to take care of a loved one as she grew older, and now, protecting her means keeping her from doing things that are not in her best interest, and she has very much let me know how much she hates me for it.

The world is full of takers. Regardless of the 'label' they wear... 'brother', 'son', 'friend', 'family', etc., there are basically two kinds of people in the world: those who live to feed off others, and those who've learned the much harder lesson of feeding themselves and finding their own way, no matter what.

In choosing to protect this person, I am putting myself squarely in the line of those who would continue to take her for granted and set her up for failure.

That's a tough place to be. A lonely place to be.

But in being a man of honor. and knowing my intentions are clean, without any false or self-interest, I'm willing to stand in the face of ugly people and say, simply: "no".

No, I don't claim to know what's "best" for this person, but I certainly do know what's worse for her, and that's where I draw the line.

The ride clears my energy and bolsters my spirit, and so I ride. These endless scenes of nature fill my helmet (and my head) for a while... good enough for now.

Cold Starts (Warm Hearts?)

The past couple days have once again dipped down into the 20's and 30's. Spring seems to have woken up the animals and the budding poplar and maple and elms are not being shy about their urgency to see the days grow warmer as they also grow longer.

Although it feels like it should be spring, there is still a lingering cold start to each day thus far that feels like tentacles from a long winter, refusing to let go.

Still, I am on my bike again, and my wife and I took a very cold evening ride two-up on Burt (my Honda Shadow Spirit 750dc) on Saturday. Warm days are coming for sure. We just have to believe that nothing unwelcome ever lasts forever.

The positive that seems to have come from all this is that every one of these good country folk seems equally haggard by how long and trying this winter has been. The temperaments I'm encountering as I wander about town are unexpectedly mellow and kind and warm. People here seem generously engaging with their smiles and concerns, but a lingering tiredness shows through chapped winter faces. 

Spring is about renewal, so maybe a deep winter challenge has made that overdue renewal that much more worthwhile..?

Regardless, another unexpected win from a motorcyclist's perspective: my ride into the coffee shop in downtown Ely to start my work day was completely bug free. 

That is one VERY welcome side-effect from these still-frozen nights. :-)

The Importance of Reflection

I left early this morning so I could start my work day at a coffee shop in the small town about 20 miles down the road. I park the bike on the gravel when I see one of our neighbors walking his dog, and we get caught up on the latest. His dog, it seems, took himself on his own 'ride' yesterday while his wife was busy transplanting garden asparagus. Ten hours later, an exhausted ghost of a dog showed up again on his doorstep, and this morning, she certainly seems all smiles and tail wags, no worse for the adventure.

As I say goodbye and fire the bike back up, the back tire spits gravel and spins out a bit as I rapidly accelerate onto the asphalt highway towards town, hoping to avoid forcing any traffic to slow down if they should round the curve and, surprise, find me entering the blind intersection. Up to speed, my attention immediately shifts to concern about deer. Multiple bikers have been killed on this very road in motorcycle-vs-deer accidents. I've studied these accidents and learned as much as I can from what I could gather from the media reports, but I'm still very acutely aware of the increased danger this particular backwoods-twisty-road-plus-forest-full-of-deer combination represents.

Quite contrary to what a lot of people who read these words may believe... it's not the 'thrill of danger' that keeps me riding here, it's a solemn respect for it, as well as a feeling of privilege that I am able to do what I chose do, ride where I want, despite this objective risk.

Of course, it's hard to think about any of that in the middle of the tire-screeching braking that happens when deer have (and continue to) run in front of my bike. It's only afterwards, upon quiet reflection like this, that it all makes sense again.

So I write this blog for myself, mostly.

One of my daughters may occasionally read something I write (usually because I send them a link), but mostly, this blog is for me to reflect and write about things in a way that I understand, and maybe only me. And that's ok.

My 'ride', whatever the vehicle, is expression in motion. It translates thought and presence into a linear trail (literally one of time and position), whether those miles are covered horizontally on a bike or flying a plane, or vertically on a skydive or climb. Any ride is, at least in part, a way of getting things out. And in doing so, it also becomes a life journal of sorts.

And then comes reflection.

I cannot imagine living life without sitting back and reflecting on what I learned along the way. Whatever your form of expression may be, look back on how that played itself out, and reflect on what you left behind, what it meant to you, each second of the way. Only then can your next ride be as good or better than the one that came before it. Each will always be different from the one before, but it'll also always then be better in some important way.

That is hard-won advice, if ever I had any to give.

Remembering to Live Again

I woke up listening to the early morning loons on the lake by our home. Our dog pretended to sleep at the foot of the bed while I got dressed, but as soon as I clicked the handle on the door he came running out, ready for our early morning walk in the woods.

We live in the Northwoods now, not far from the Canadian border and surrounded by one of the most pristine wilderness areas still in existence. Our dog drags his tongue out and he smiles in readiness as I tell him to wait, and lace up my boots. We both bolt out the door. 

The crispness of the day is not lost on me, and soon we are walking up the national forest (cross-country ski) trail just a few hundred yards from our front door. Bald eagles soar above the dog and me, and the lake is still and reflective of the budding poplars and pines in every direction. Loons swoon their morning song and song birds of every kind chirp and trill, as our part of this forest is in the middle of a primary songbird migratory path.

So I decide on the walk back that this would be an excellent 'first day' to ride. 

The weather this winter and spring has been rough, even by Minnesota standards. We spent a good month in January hovering around -40℉ lows, and -20℉ highs. And even though spring is here, and (at least on the calendar) it has been 'Spring' for a while, last week we woke up to 3 inches of snow (the northern Minnesota town of Duluth about 2 hours south of us got 10 inches).

Really, though, any of several days in the past couple weeks would have been good 'first days' to ride, but neither my heart nor my head would have been fully in it, so I kept the bikes parked and waited until both would be fully engaged. Not just for safety (though partly for that), but also to not take anything away from the ride ... to be able to fully enjoy the the exhilaration and the experience.

The thing is... I've forgotten somewhere in the past year, with the continuous stress of relocating and rearranging and moving our lives up here, and accommodating the very demanding needs of my mother, and planning and as yet being unable to go see my father again. And working like crazy, and... the physical toll all of this took on my health and general feeling of wellbeing... well, all that was a bit too much. 

I feel like I'm just now waking up from a dream, remembering who I am again, so that I can keep being that person.

I feel like I'm remember how to live again.

The bike is definitely helping. :-)

Winter's coming, I'm not ready

Out on Sunshine this morning, though the cloudy early morning sky and biting 40-degree weather would have the heart of me this morning. I have not been riding enough the past few weeks, getting all of the house-related responsibilities done and riding trucks and pulling trailers back and forth to get the new place ready for us and winter.

Sunshine growled this morning as she realized that she also wanted the riding season to continue. We breathed in the early morning sky and empty Sunday morning roads and pushed ourselves a little aggressively to a nearby stop to write this.

Winter comes too soon - I want more sun and sky and warmth.

A Different Kind of Movement

I had the opportunity recently to learn from a different kind of medium than I have been writing about thus far: a canoe in the Boundary Waters of northern Minnesota.

On several mornings and some evenings for the past two weeks, I have remained about 280 miles from my garage and my bikes, and so my quest for solitude and movement have been fulfilled instead by a paddle and canoe rather than the powerful steel and rubber of a motorcycle.

I traded the frenetic sounds and chaotic traffic scenes of the city streets for those of an incredibly serene lake, the softening morning and evening calls of loons, the nearby warning splashes of beavers as they busily prepare for the fall and winter months, and ... well, you get the idea. Just lovely.

In movement there is truth, and the paddle and canoe had no less to teach me than the throttle and bars, it seems.

At first, there were the practical lessons of balance while moving a solo canoe across the lake. The immediate and obvious imbalance (of a single person in the back of a canoe) I quickly resolved with a stuff sack full of river rocks pushed far up the bow. The rocks kept the full keel line mostly in the water from bow to stern, and gave my canoe the ability to track straight lines with every stroke. The other lessons, however, only came with some effort.

I next learned appreciate how movement across a windy lake is really a dance with four things:

  the wind itself,
  the 'sail' that the large broadside of the canoe presents to the wind,
  the paddle stroke, and
  the bow point or tip direction of the canoe.

Although I am powerful enough to stroke through a strong crosswind and keep the canoe generally swinging across upwind and downwind vectors in my desired direction of travel, all the wild swinging left and right was wasting a lot of energy and seemed pointless. A much better strategy turned out to be to just let the wind have its way, and keep the tip of the canoe pointed directly INTO the oncoming wind blast. With the wind traveling evenly across both left and right sides of the canoe, moving forward directly into the wind was mostly the same on a windy day as on a still weather day. Progress forward was easy, even if the direction wasn't perfect.

Only once I reached a convenient wind shadow cast by an upwind cliff or hill or grove of trees would turning crosswind likewise be effortless, and then I would just let the crosswind push me to my final destination. Once you're upwind, you have the advantage over both wind and position, and you can use both to your advantage.

Then came the less obvious lessons that only several hours of paddling would teach a novice: how to use a bent paddle to its fullest advantage. At first I thought the bend in the paddle was simply to keep the paddle more vertical and facing the mass of water as I pulled through each stroke on either side of the canoe. Without knowing more about this, and because I was going alone, even on a windless day the canoe was still constantly swinging its bow left and right, left and right, as I struggled to keep it generally tracking in any given direction by paddling from both left and right sides as evenly as possible.

But then something awesome happened: I finally got tired of paddling!

As the muscles powering my paddle stroke weakened, a few of these strokes just plain ran out of steam before I reached the full length aft. As more of my strokes got sloppy and stopped short, I started noticing the bent paddle itself acting as a kind of 'rudder', one that applied a small sideways force vector to the canoe (mostly depending on how sloppy my power stroke turned out to be).

The next morning, I decided to try to apply this sideways force vector to the paddle intentionally, and well, voila! I was now able to paddle from either side of the canoe and keep the bow moving perfectly straight through the water. I could simply paddle and control the canoe perfectly from either side with a simple twist of the wrist near the end of my stroke. My paddle was now acting as both motor and rudder simultaneously as I moved it through the full length of each stroke, and this meant I was suddenly MUCH more efficient at moving the canoe forward, regardless of prevailing weather.

Awesome!

So, these were the practical lessons - but what of the bigger meaning of all this? That is what I asked myself as I cast a rod into the crystal clear blue lake and drifted along on many mornings.

Well, we all get pushed around by the 'winds' of life - all of us, without exception.

If we try to steer away from the eye of the storm, either left or right, even just a little bit, we just end up creating more work for us as we try to move in any such direction and get pushed even further off-track by powerful forces. The fastest and surest way through any difficult wind is to charge directly into it. I really think that's true for life in and out of the canoe.

As to the tool I already had in my hand, the paddle itself, I think we often underestimate how life's experiences teach us to use the tools we have at our disposal differently and, in particular, much more effectively. That's the real benefit to any substantial experience, I think - experience teaches us to be better and do better with what we already have.

The other lesson I learned, on a personal level, is that the movement is more important to me than the environment.  I am learning that movement facilitates the lessons I need to learn, regardless of the medium I am immersed within.

So... I frankly learned a lot (just as much?) from a simple canoe and a wooden paddle on a quiet lake, as much as if I had just put to ponder a couple hundred miles on Sunshine or Burt across crowded cityscapes and countless rural bends.

Movement really *is* the thing.

Confidence & lessons

I left at what appeared to be dawn today, in the fading days of summer here in Minneapolis. The mirky sky and wet sidewalk as I moved to the backyard told part of the story, a long overdue rain of some kind (probably not enough to matter) had finally spent a little time overhead last night.

There were some tiny driveway puddles, but not standing water to enough to worry about, I think to myself. The sky remains thick with low-hanging scud and this drizzle that feels insufficient enough to wet anything. Maybe we'll get more rain later.

I decide to ride north east towards Taylor's Falls on the river and start my work day there. The cityscape and throng of the impending rush-hour millions quickly give way to a more sedate scene as I skirt around and avoid the highways and bi-ways in favor of backroads and residential drags to stay pointed where I'm headed.

Handling slick streets and wet seems to have etched its lessons into my brain and reflexes, and mostly, I don't even think of the concerns in this kind of weather. Slick streets from floating oil and debris. Limited visibility from a continuously speckled or fogged or both helmet visor. Making myself extra-visible to traffic, that completely disregards motorcycle traffic on days like these. And then there's the wet paint.... well, I almost had that figured out. :-)

As I'm pulling out of an intersection that I waited too long at, I was a bit aggressive on the throttle in first gear. Sure enough, as I'm urging the bike forward, I fail to notice the effect this will have on my rear tire as it passes over the slick wet painted crosswalk directly underneath my front tire.

True to form, the Bandit 1250s pulls hard out of first, like a tractor firing hard on all cylinders, and yet the second my rear wheel hits that 2 foot patch of wet paint, I'm suddenly gliding along and my rear wheel is spinning up a storm. The surge-surge feeling had me grabbing for clutch and easing off the throttle instantly until we past the painted walkway, and then all was well again with the world and we pull away, lesson learned.

I guess I had a lot of confidence at my ability to handle rain-slicked roads, but obviously I still have lessons to learn - experience is really still the best teacher.

It's chilly for August - I'm gonna grab a coffee... :-)

Life's Ups and Downs (Mostly Ups)

It's been a while since I've been in the headspace to write about anything. My life swelled into my creative free time and this blog also occupies that space.

These writings are supposed to be about how I've been learning through movement, and even though I haven't been writing about it, I sure have been moving... a lot! Sunshine (my 2008 Suzuki Bandit 1250s) and I have clocked over 5500 miles of riding since April, and Burt (the 2003 Shadow Spirit 750dc) and I continue to take my wife and me for two-up spins around the hood and to short shopping trips, clocking up not nearly as many miles, but all of them fun.

Both bikes bring me a lot of fun, but Sunshine, though, has become a special kind of 'extension' of who I am as a human being. That bike really holds a special place in my life. When I'm riding her, everything just feels natural and 'right', and when she's parked in the garage, my mind occasionally drifts there, knowing she's sitting quietly, and I find myself really looking forward to the next ride.

I've also been to Colorado a couple times since I last wrote to spend time with my mom and handle her medical needs, and I've also tripped to southern California to spend time with my dad. 

In all those tens of thousands of miles this year, both on bike and car, I have really just spent a lot of time reflecting. 

Sitting still, in a pretty quiet room or space, is for sure one way of meditating, and I know it works for a lot of folks. But my form of meditation has always involved movement of some kind or another. Moving across the land, on foot and by vehicle, across rocks and cliffs, moving in and across water, moving through the sky, in free-fall or in some kind of vehicle, ... you get the idea.

Movement allows me to focus all my attention and to also lose myself in the experience. Not all movement does this to the same degree, obviously, but all movement seems capable of helping me achieve that state of "being-non-being" that clarifies and distills and makes me feel whole again when I'm done.

When I was last returning from my trip to California, about a month ago, I got a call that brought me to tears. My friend and neighbor, Ron, was in a very bad motorcycle accident and was on his 4th surgery to help screw and staple him back together again. Fast-forward to today, and it appears he's going to be fine, thankfully. But he won't be walking for several months and won't have the use of his arms for most of that recovery time as well. He was lucky.

I've spent a lot of my free time the past several weeks visiting with Ron. I listen to his stories, his adventures of places I have never seen, and may never see the way he's seen them. Every few days, I try to bring him coffee from an exotic new destination, a coffee shop he may or may not have visited in the past. I always send him a picture of the coffee headed his way from my "coffee adventure ride", so he has something to look forward to, and when I get it back to him we talk about what I saw and the ride out there and back. 

I really enjoy my coffee time with Ron, and the stories... all the stories. I know we're both looking forward to the day he gets back on his bike.

A few folks have asked me if Ron's crash makes me want to stop riding... "of course not", I reply, "life is for the living," and some are obviously confused. But then again, most folks who ride passionately or live passionately already know better than to ask that question. It's the armchair folks that ask, mostly.

Life *is* for the living. Each day *is* a gift. It sounds like so much cliche, but it's all true. Nothing is guaranteed, no outcome, no "tomorrow" that people all around me seem to live for. 

And so I ride each day and take in each moment now like it's going to be my last. When I skydive, I'm 100% present. When I fly small airplanes, the same. Running or walking or climbing or ... same. I'm not "racing towards death", or really "racing" towards any particular outcome. I'm just maximizing the moment - living ... really LIVING ... in the now.

I wish you all a life full of peace and adventure, a life well-lived and worthy of your own stories worth telling.

Movement

Took Burtie out for an early morning spin while the world still slept. We encircled the city in a grand miles-wide loop for a couple hours as the sun creeps into the sky and, eventually, we wind back into our own neighborhood and familiar territory again, just in time for a couple nearby coffeeshops to finally open. Sunday mornings in the cities make for nice riding.

Why does movement feel so good? So essential? When did sitting still become anathema to my being? I feel the urge to sit, but I am compelled to stay in motion. I feel the urge to quiet my mind, and yet the myriad responsibilities and demands that have been laid upon me, and those that I put on myself, all come calling every waking second of the day.

Stillness is what I sorely need and can little afford at the moment. At least that's how it seems.

This Life

Since I got back yesterday at midnight in the truck, I've been riding Burt around town trying to finalize plans for a trip out west. Work was brutal yesterday, a long 11 hours of crazy - and more demanded of me this weekend.

I called my father this morning after riding the cityscape for an early couple hours, trying to reset my brain and think a bit. The morning air is perfect, the sky perfect, the roads perfect. And the early morning weekend traffic seems more calm than usual. Quite excellent riding. 

My dad sounds better; he says he is feeling much better. I'm trying to get him to come back with me and promise him I'll return him back to California whenever he likes, but he wants more time. He says it's going to take him a few weeks to get ready for a road trip, to feel 100% up to it. I reluctantly understand. 

It can't be easy at his age, although I'm only 35 years from being there myself. That time will fly by... it already has been flying by.

My mom, however, is torn between the life she used to have (when she actually felt alive and joyful) and this life of obsoleteness that she is living now, stagnating her days away as my brother's live-in bank account. Her purpose, her reason for living, is and was always outside of her, external to her, her whole life. Even now she clings to any outside purpose she can, and my brother gives her purpose by having her pay for everything. With the years she has left, she could make changes. She could re-invent herself. But mom is vehemently refusing to invest in herself that way, to develop a new purpose - a real *inside* reason to exist and feel alive again. Again, I understand. It's tough to make changes when your life's patterns have been cut so deep. 

Everybody chooses how they go.

Seeing the two of them, both my parents and both from the same start and being the same age, yet so different in their outlooks and outcomes... it really fuels me to live each day to the absolute fullest, to maximize my friendships and my partnership with my wife... to really just live this life in the most positive way possible. 

Really live it.

Exploring

It was a beautiful week this week for exploring.

Every morning, either Burt (my Honda Shadow Spirit 750dc) or Sunshine (my Suzuki Bandit 1250s) would launch into the pre-dawn gloaming. Usually it's Sunshine and me, and also usually, we point our noses east so that we catch full view of the delicate hues in the lightening sky as the sun crests higher. The show starts around 4AM these days, and every morning saw us on a different route, purposely launching into unfamiliar territory, just seeing what's out there for the sake of being out there.

By the time we leave the big city in our rearview and find ourselves immersed in countryside along twisting river-hugging or hill-hugging views, the "oranges" start. A faint burnt umber glow emphasizes the underbellies of any cloud, the striking contrast complements of the sky's big, blazing brush as it comes into view on our side of the planet again. Winding through turns on a bike and watching it all, it feels like a privilege to see the world wake up like this, as the experience wakes up my mind and body along with it.

On all days, slowly, the throng of traffic starts. Other vehicles begin merging into the flow, headed every-which-way. The sky puts away the morning show and drapes itself in blues and whites, and the day is officially "started" again.

On Tuesday, I used the morning to ride into Wisconsin and check out the flooded river valley. They just had a dam break and most of the other dams in the area are flooded over. The dam at Taylor's Falls had floodwaters moving right over top of it, at least a couple feet over it. The entire St. Croix river valley I rode across was flooded.

Trees living on the low-lying lands that pepper this part of the river were completely underwater along with their grassy island homes. Interstate and Wild River parks were flooded as well, and parking lots and buildings were partly or fully submerged.

And the waters are supposed to keep going *up* for a while, yet.

I take in the beauty and the crush of too much water and marvel at the power of nature to do what it's going to do. I start that work day in Taylor's Falls, MN and finished it in Osceola, WI, and ride back with thoughts of floods in my head.

Yesterday, however, I spent the morning hours from pre-dawn to the start of my work day riding due north. I was headed to our farm in northern Minnesota and planned to spend my work day in Ely, a charming northern town on the border of BWCA.

Although I wanted to make it a slow-and-lazy 250 mile trip and come back the following day, there was an urgency to my ride. My father, 85 years old, who lives alone in California, has been sick, and my instincts are telling me I need to go check on him.

Although I could take Sunshine west and south to Los Angeles, from where I live about 2000 miles distant, I'm just afraid it would take too long and I'd need a lot of days to get there on bike. And so the morning ride up north was to a purpose: fetch my reliable old truck from the farm, park the bike, and continue west in a vehicle that I can sleep and work in.

I wrap up my work day in Ely, park the bike at the farm, and drive the truck back in the middle of the night. It's going to be a long trip to California, but worth it to spend time with my dad again while he's still around.

Rain

Minnesota has seen a lot of it. Every day this week I've encountered it on the bike. Morning, evening, daytime. Every day.

It's ok - I really don't mind a warm rain, the soak feels kinda good actually. The bike gets cleaned off (well, not really, but the muddy dirt is concentrated to a few spots where the water tends to accumulate as opposed to a fine dirt laying all over the bike) and the wetness cuts the heat of driving around in summer with full gear on. Most of my gear sheds water fine, but I have to come up with a way not to end up with inches of standing water in my leather boots by the end of a long rain ride. Haven't figured that out yet.

The actual challenge of riding in and through lightening, hail, rain, downpours, etc. seems pretty straightforward now, known actors and all that. It's also pretty sweet that the streets (wet as they are) are usually empty during the thick of a storm. People seem to slow down and stay sheltered, and that's just fine by me. I don't mind being the only bike and one of the few vehicles 'braving' the road. It's really no big deal.

I'm sure some of my confidence comes from these new Pilot Road 5s - they are outstanding wet weather tires, even driving through several-inch deep 'hydroplaning puddles', the bike stays pretty firmly in place most of the time. Still, I try to avoid the deeper water (or steer through the water's periphery if can't avoid it entirely) because I don't know what obstacles lay hidden in any of those rainwater washes.

During the last thunderstorm ride, I drowned my cheap-o ($50) Amazon Bluetooth headset receiver, so now I'm looking for a wired setup to replace it. Even if it was still working perfectly, my rides these days are taking me longer than the battery life of most of these devices, and so I'm faced with either carrying around multiple charged wireless devices so I can stay dialed in, or just eliminating the wireless factor altogether and just going wired with my phone-to-helmet setup.

The weather has been charged these days. Very changeable and erratic/unpredictable. A lot like my life these days. So much in flux, so many storms all around, but I'm navigating through those, too.

The bike and the freedom to ride helps a lot with keeping all that in check.

Living Life

I had a nice talk with my dad the other day, and he reminded me how important it is to really *live* your life. Face challenges head-on, take on bad actors with confidence and honesty, and always just go-for-it to your purpose, whatever that may be.

And so, it's been a while and I had an "itch" that I needed to explore. In short, I miss the sky.

I used to skydive every weekend and fly small planes as well. There is something about being vertical and having vertical freedom. It's been said many different ways by many more eloquent than me, about breaking the shackles and rising against gravity and all that... but still, there is *something* to being in the sky like the birds that really has no comparison.

And so on that note, I left pre-dawn. It's nice now that the morning and evening sun grants me plenty of time for distance travel before I have to work my day job. I decided to skip the interstate and head north to a drop zone I was only vaguely aware of, Skydive Superior, on the shores of Lake Superior in Superior, Wisconsin, just south of Duluth. The sky was calm and the early morning roads perfect as I carved endlessly through backcountry Minnesota out towards the river valley, then up the scenic river valley route for an hour through a green-saturated countryside road that follows the river north. I reached my cross-over point at St Croix Falls. There we dive into Wisconsin's highway 35, a more or less northbound backcountry road that itself took me past seemingly-endless barns and silos and farms and through charming towns in rural Wisconsin. "Population: 125" kind of towns.

The final push up from a comfortable coffee shop in Webster, Wisconsin (Fresh Start Coffee Roasters) into Superior lead me straight to the airport terminal and a CLOSED hangar. "Skydive Superior", it seems, is no more. Instead, there is now Skydive Duluth in its stead, a brand new drop zone started by one of the die-hard locals who wanted to keep skydiving alive in the Duluth area. As the story goes, this all happened after a very unfortunate Skydive Superior airplane crash involving skydivers. It had a happy outcome. Luckily, when airplanes go 'bonk', skydivers and their pilots are all wearing parachutes. :-)

I chat for a long while with one of the FBO (terminal operator) folks, who fills me in on the back story. Then, one of the flight instructors there comes in and we get to talking. I reminisce about my old days of flying and, before long, I am signing up to come fly with him in the coming week. What? Am I really ready for this? My heart says yes, willingly, gratefully "yes!", to the idea of flying again. I guess I'm going to be airborne again soon, one way or another (or both), as a pilot and as a skydiver.

I thank him and find a Superior-based coffee shop in which to finish my work day. I close out the place and head home, through another long windy Minnesota road, across old railroad bridges and down along the Veteran's Memorial Highway. It is an hour of stunning (STUNNING) and curvy countryside with massive evergreens and maples towering on both sides of the road. Loved every minute of it.

But, as with all good things, I was forced to call it and head for the interstate when I saw huge thunderstorms brewing to the south of me. The wind started howling, gusting 30-50 mph due west and the cutting crosswind made my speedy interstate ride southbound into the looming storm a bit challenging. Still, we make it just in time to avoid the bulk of the rain I see washing down from an angry looking sky just to the southwest.

As I tuck Sunshine, my Bandit 1250, into the garage and connect up her charging station, I think about the day we just had. After a nearly 400-mile roundtrip and all that we saw and did, I pat her seat and remember Dad's words.

A day well-lived, that's what today feels like.

Engine & Sudden Stops

Rode out at dawn this morning, packed for a 250 mile ride up north but something didn't feel "right" about the bike or the ride. I couldn't shake or ignore that nagging feeling. The interstate was empty and I was moving fast and would make good time and get there before 9am, but... I turned east about 50 miles north of the city and decided I'd ride the Minnesota-Wisconsin river basin back south towards the city in a grand loop. Ending up back home today felt "more right" than continuing northbound.

Staying close seemed/felt like a smart move, but I still couldn't put my finger on it. Sunshine, my Suzuki Bandit 1250s, is riding fine. I lubed her chain and did my morning checks but something still felt 'off' as I was headed down the long country road. The hairs on the back of my head were standing up. Something was definitely off.

The ride was nonetheless beautiful, the sun slowly warming up the world as it started to blaze higher in the sky. I got to the river valley and found a small cafe I've been to before near a local rock climbing hotspot and pulled to the right to let a car that was behind me pass. I intended to do a sharp left u-turn and park in front of the cafe.

The blue car that was tailing me passed and I started a sharp left turn with plenty of room to spare and ... Sunshine just quit without any warning. Her engine stopped dead.

I was mid-turn at the time, the bike was leaned over and I was stand-up steering her left when the engine quit. I was moving forward about 3 miles per hour, so really I had no momentum to work with. I threw my left leg down and tried to keep her upright and we did the 'hop-drop-hop-drop' dance a few more feet until she just fell over onto her left side soft bags. It was all I could do to set her down gently. I immediately cleared the area for dangers and put her hazards on and flagged the oncoming traffic to slow down. There were cars and a dump truck now in my lane and heading my way. They all slowed and gawked and moved on by, and when I had a free moment and a blank space on the road, I lifted her up and walked her over to the side of the road and parked her.

I tried a couple times to start her up in the street, but she was not interested in turning over. No starter noises or relay clicks. Nothing. I was in neutral, and checked the kill switches and kick stand, ignition was on, clutch was in, but twice I tried and twice she ignored my 'start' key entirely. I parked and got off the bike, frustrated that this is the second time she's quit unexpectedly in the middle of a turn.

I look for loose wires, check the EFI harness and look for 'check' engine warnings on the dash with the ignition turned 'on' - nothing wrong. Since it had been a few minutes since my last attempt, I try one last time to start her up and ... she lights right up. Engine revs fine, I try and she pulls in first gear, she revs in neutral, all as though nothing happened. I put her on the center stand and make sure her wheel spins in first, neutral is neutral, etc. All fine. So I decide to give her about 45 minutes to cool down while I have a coffee and consider my options.

I'm a long way away from home and my garage and tools, so I decide to head cautiously back in that direction, the slow way, using sparsely-used back roads the entire way. Now I have to fit the ride back into my work day, but Sunshine and I will get there eventually. And it's a pretty way to get home, so why not.

In all, I'm very glad I trusted my instincts again. Glad she didn't quit while I was passing a semi at 90 mph on the interstate. I can handle a controlled set-down onto her soft bags. Everything worked out ok because I am used to listening to and trusting my gut.

Yeah... it is frustrating when life doesn't give you a problem you can readily solve. But I'll get to the bottom of it. Just a matter of time.

The Riding Life

I no longer drive my Xterra as a means of getting from A to B. My truck is parked about 225 miles north of here and serves as a 'haul equipment and tools and trailers' vehicle for the farm.

I just ride. Every day, in all conditions, on the cruiser or on my sportbike, I just ride.

The riding life is really addictive. It feels like with every ride I'm learning, getting better, getting smarter, more dialed into both the bike and the ride. Every mile makes a difference. Every minute on the bike counts for something.

And it's very zen, a very meditative place for me to be. Even when I'm just circling the city or riding to a coffee shop, the bike instantly calms and focusses me on the task at hand.

There really is nothing like it. None that I've experienced anyway, and I've done a lot of things.

Challenging Weather

I parked my Xterra up at the farm I'm rehabbing over a week ago, and have been riding a motorcycle since. I need the truck up north to help move around sheets of drywall and roofing materials, etc, but for the rest of my travel needs, I've been on two wheels literally every ridable day this year.

I had planned to work on the farm again this weekend, so Friday morning pre-dawn I left on Sunshine, the Bandit 1250s, to make the 225 mile trip to our northwoods farm. I would spend the morning riding up, the work day on my computer, and then I would be positioned to work the evening and rest of the weekend on the roof and house.

Although the trip went fine, the weather had shifted and it became bitterly cold (down into the 40's) once I was about 50 miles north of the city. At the 100 mile mark, it started to drizzle and by the time I was 150 miles into the trip north, the drizzle had turned into an icy rain that just zapped all the heat away from my layers and hands faster than my body could replace it. I finally stopped at a McDonalds, with about 90 minutes of rainy, cold, backcountry travel ahead, because I could no longer legitimately feel my fingertips and my fingers were unbearably stiff. Even preparing for the stopping and clutching at that stop was challenging, and it took a lot of aggressive hand shaking and fist squeezing to get enough blood going to manage fine motor control of the bike again. At least the rain had stopped a few miles back.

But we parked and I ordered coffee and considered my options. After nursing all the heat out of that large McD's coffee and guzzling what remained for future inner warmth, I set out again for the final stretch of treelined country roads. It was challenging but, eventually, both Sunshine and I pulled into the tall grass of the farm. I set a flat board under her kickstand so she wouldn't sink into the now-muddy stuff and I set about warming myself back up and getting on with work and house business.

Fast forward to yesterday, and although there was a brief period on Friday evening where the rain had let up, the clouds were now back-building again - another storm was brewing. The ominous forecast for yesterday said a morning of cloud building would lead to even more cold and howling winds and thunderstorms and rain for at least 24 more hours. A storm front that had produced tornados further south was now headed directly this way. 

No way I would be on the roof or doing anything productive in this weather, and so I called it and decided to ride back. Unfortunately, it took a while to get things settled at the farmstead yesterday, consuming most of the morning. By the time I was heading out, the wind was literally roaring through the trees and dark clouds and lightening were massing up on this huge north-south front some distance to the west. Confident, or really more 'hopeful' than confident, that I could outrun the storm by heading straight south, Sunshine and I launched towards home again. 

We made it exactly 30 minutes into our trip before the sky just opened up and let us have it. The gust front that proceeded that weather actually lightened up her tires and started to pick her up and away from the wet asphalt as we were taking the merging bend onto Highway 53 southbound. That is a very unnerving feeling in a wet curve at 65 mph. 

I finally found and pulled under a nearby small-town gas station awning to regroup and put rain covers onto my soft bags and rearrange my backpack with laptop to try to keep the contents dry. Water was in everything. My phone was wet and my outer soft-bag pockets already had a couple inches of standing water in them, so I decided that's it, I'm gonna wait until the building storm starts to subside and make a break for it back to the farm.

Well, the weather never did say 'uncle', and even more storm cells came through and the rain keep saturating the ground and the wind kept howling out of all directions. I sat and ate a slow breakfast burrito and talked with the locals at a nearby food co-op, and watched and waited. Bummer. The forecast weather, according to the weather radar, was just gonna get worse as the day turned to night. So much for waiting, I'm heading back to the farm NOW.

The folks in the co-op couldn't believe it when I finally got up and started to gear up again.

"You're going to ride out there in that?!", the cashier called to me when she saw me zipping up my jacket. 

"No time like the present to do something stupid," I called back to her with a smile. I was on the bike and headed back to my farm a few minutes later. What proceeded was some of the most challenging and technical wet weather riding I've ever been through. 

Although I was well-used to being able to clear raindrops off my helmet at speed by simply looking left and right quickly to get the water to bead up and roll off the visor, the rain was so constant now and the wind so violent that that technique did nothing, the visor was instantly speckled up with moving water after every attempt to clear it. So I gave up trying, and I found my brain instead picking up familiar shapes through the downpour and random moving blotches of wet and indistinct clarity available through rain-blasted view through my helmet. 

Woah, there's the yellow midline. Brake lights ahead? Is that a deer? Is that road debris or standing water? Headlights coming. Stay in your lane. Avoid standing water on the bends. Stay loose, stay relaxed.

But we charged ahead, Sunshine and I, unwise as it may have been, in the earnest desire to just get to familiar ground once more. It took all of my learned skill and experience on the bike thus far to keep myself safe and upright, and, strangely, through all the chaos of the stormy ride, my inside voice was actually silent and still. 

I was 100% present in that moment. There was nowhere else to be. Nowhere else to think about. Nothing else to occupy any portion of my brain because my brain was saturated by everything - every tiny bit of stimulus from the outside world and all the feedback from my senses - in order to keep me upright and moving forward and safe. And through it all, I actually felt strangely relaxed and calm. 

Pulling into the tall grass again was a relief. 

Even as prepared as I was for the wet weather, my leather boots had a couple inches of standing water in them and my pelvis had a strange "ice cream headache" from the inches-deep puddle of icy rainwater that I'd been sitting in on the ride back.

It was a wild ride through challenging weather - and it was really good. The ride made me touch something, reach someplace, that I'm not sure how to describe, even through I've been there a few different times before.

Dad

My father and I just had a really long talk (helmet-enabled) as I rode out through city and country scenes today. I took routes I've really never been on before, some that I have been, and we spoke about the nature of life, spirituality and human nature. We spoke of joy and peace, of partnership and friendship, and he spoke clearly and from the heart, of his mistakes and his wins and failures.

He is old - now mid-80's - and his health is questionable, but with every conversation I feel more connected and put together, as a man, as a human. More whole, if that makes sense.

And it's not really what he says or doesn't say, what we talk about - it's more like how folks say you have two conversations going on at the same time, the conversation going on in words, and the conversation going on without words. I've heard different percentages of each, and I'm sure each conversation and its participants vary these amounts, but with my dad, there seems to be a whole lot that he isn't saying that's really important for me to receive and understand, and somehow I do. This wordless exchange of ideas and thoughts and wishes and hopes. It's worth the call a thousand times over.

Another beautiful spring/early-summer day. It's gonna be a hot one, but nestled in the curvy twisty country landscape between mammoth oaks and elms covered in ivy, my helmet fills with green as the chill in the air cuts into my open riding jacket and catches me by surprise.

It's lovely beyond measure, and I spend the rest of the ride in a moving meditation, listening to the purr of the engine as the bike and I open up under old railroad bridges and lazily unwind through countless tree-lined curves.

Mindfully Present

You hear that a lot these days - about the importance of being 'mindful', being where you are and nowhere else. I agree.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have the answer - ride.

Riding a motorcycle makes it very difficult to be anyplace else. Riding is freedom and when you've got freedom and the machine you're on expresses your every thought in effortless fluidity, you've got nowhere else to be. Everywhere you are, however fast you're going, however much the wind is pushing back, however sticky or loose the gravel or asphalt or dirt, ... that's exactly where you are, when you are. Time and space collapse into the single expressive motion of you on the bike. It's beautiful.

Rode Burt a lot yesterday (my Honda Shadow Spirit 750dc cruiser) and even rode him out in a full hail and rain thunderstorm. Not on purpose, mind you, I thought I could outrun the storm so we could have a couple pints of ice cream in the house to enjoy our favorite shows, but I got caught in a big way regardless.

I just smiled and laughed the whole ride. The whole ride.

Don't get me wrong - I got soaked to the bones by the sticky warm evening downpour and blinded by the lightning crashing all around, got pelted in the face by tiny hail pellets that stung with every bite, but I still laughed and laughed. I was just thinking how Burt really needed a wash and polish, and so nature provided the perfect wash.

But I also laughed because everybody around me thought I was nuts, all of them driving around in their trucks and cars and SUVs and hiding under storefronts and awnings and bus stops hoping for a dry moment to "run for it". They looked and me riding by and I caught several of them taking phone pictures and shaking their heads or looking at me with blank stares.

No matter. I didn't hide. I charged into the fray. I didn't run to a car, either. I just rode and took it all in, all of it, raw and exposed, swimming slowly through flash-water puddles as high as my chain and countless other riding challenges. And I loved every minute of it.

Today, Sunshine (the Suzuki Bandit 1250s) and were on the move at sunrise, and the sky is cloudy white and clearing from the storms, which lasted all night. I'm sitting at a new-to-me cafe in a small Wisconsin border town typing this and getting ready to switch gears to my day job. The couple hour ride out here was perfect.

It's a good life. A very good life.

Reaching and Riding

Riding is reaching for something I cannot quite grasp. It enables the reach, supports it, but doesn't really give me a clue as to the full extent of it. The ride melds math, physics, body, mind and spirit into a singular expression in motion. It delivers truth in a way I am unable to put into better words than these.

Out at sunrise exploring the world today. The clouds seem to be breaking up from the wetting rain of the night before. I decide to take in the city scape before heading into the country. My favorite coffee shop and first stop with the bike is now closed until 7am (they used to open a half-hour earlier), so I ride out again through the varied city landscape, taking in the university district and moving into the low-rent neighborhoods and out again towards the tracks and river, where massive tarp-covered barges dominate the river on both sides.

By the time I reach the Mississippi river basin southeast of Saint Paul and start crawling the farmland backroads first south, then east, then north again, the sky changes its mind and begins to darken again. The warm wind I had been cruising through turned sharply cold and the clouds threaten and thicken again the further north I ride. I cough a couple times in my helmet as my unprotected neck takes the brunt of the bitter bite.

I decide to take the first road west and head south and back towards home again. The sun is high enough in the sky that my wife should be awake and I want to make a day of it with her somewhere fun. Still the cold wind bites hard, and I am ready for a break. It's been a couple of hours of solid riding on the bike and the ride is taking an unusual toll today. I see a passing "cafe" I've never tried before and ride back and park in front.

It's an out and out breakfast spot, but I tell the waitress I'm just looking for coffee and to sit outside if possible. She says "sure, I'll bring you a coffee outside" without much affect and so I make my way out to a plastic table to write this. I must have looked pretty worn, since she brings me a cup of plain water and a mug with an entire thermos of the hot stuff, leaving the thermos on my table.

I said "thank you" and, later, I catch her passing eye again and say "I really appreciate it, the coffee is good." I can see and feel how she catches herself genuinely smiling back at me - how that smile surprises that small but still-unjaded part of her that once believed in human beings to be generally kind and decent folks. No doubt serving thousands of impolite strangers over the years has taken it's toll. That is written very plainly on her prematurely-aged face.

I pour some more hot coffee from the thermos, take a sip, and type this... and contemplate all this stuff as I do.