Off Axis

Where did the summer go?

Amidst bike rides and heat waves and dips in the lake, suddenly, summer is gone and we are in the early throes of September.

It was blissful, mostly.

My kids are growing up, my daughter planning hikes and lake days with friends, my son riding bikes at a level that will soon surpass mine, and my husband and I, in the background, distracted by work and casting a sideways glance every so often at their progress, missing the important parts probably, and not thinking about the potential regret that will come.

My husband and I went to the south of France for a week, with a little jaunt to Monaco, where we ogled fancy people, swam in the ocean, wandered the cobbled streets, and drank a lot of lovely wine. It was perfection, and the first vacation we’ve had together without kids in twelve years. Turns out we still rather like each other’s company, and it was both refreshing and reassuring to be together again, just us, and know that we are okay.

My dog died.
He was fourteen and slowly, silently growing a mass on his larynx. He was fine until suddenly, he was not, and within a week and a half, my daily life was stripped of the happiest, purest form of love I have ever known. It’s only been a few weeks, and my world feels startlingly stark and empty.

I keep telling a friend that it feels as though the world is off its axis. The whole summer has felt a bit strange this way, and in the past month especially, I am struggling to right it.

My riding was confident, fun, and exciting, in the early season, as friends have been showing me secret trails, new builds far in the mountains where there is no phone reception, or some tucked next to trails we already know; one only needs to know where to look.

But August has been rife with crashes, silly things that have broken my fingertips or bruised my hips and thighs. I have gotten back on the airbag and worked on backflips, but can’t seem to lock it down, and each failure makes the next attempt more daunting because quite simply, it hurts.

This past Saturday, I wanted to tick off all the newer double black diamond technical trails in the bike park, and a friend came with me to lead the way. There are big and steep features, and I was feeling tense. I crashed on the final lap, compressing a fork through all 200 mm of travel, doing a full pushup, and turning all that potential energy into kinetic energy as I launched over the bars after taking a bad line and putting my front tire into a hole at the bottom of a rock roll (ridden properly by someone else in this video at the 30 second mark). I landed hard on my chest and stomach. I was fully armoured, so I walked away with a general sense of impact but no major cuts or bruises.

Later that afternoon, I am shuttled up a different mountain in a very fun truck to ride laps with boys who are much stronger riders than I, on a secret trail I’ve ridden once before in the pouring rain. It is looser in the dry, and just as steep as it ever was, with little marble stones skittering behind the boys as they blast through ahead of me. In my attempts to hit all the features, I ride into a drop a touch too fast, land it, but pull brakes for fear I will mess up the second drop, and somehow launch myself into the bushes, knocking off a shoe and my visor in the process. It is comical, and there is a photograph of me shoeless and trapped amongst foliage before they hauled me out of the brush. I’m scraped and bruised from this one, but I finish the lap and ride another, only I am riding timid and tense.

Sunday, my entire body aches, and I wander through the world like an arthritic gnome.
Monday, I think, I will ride like myself again.
Again, a new trail, tucked away, only built this season. It’s steep and committing from the get-go, and a switch in my brain saps me of all confidence. I look down the trail, knowing it will go, knowing that if only I could relax and get on my bike, that it will flow and be the kind of trail that I would normally fall hopelessly in love with, as my tires roll gently down the fall line of the mountainside.
But no, each time I get on my bike and start the descent, my hands deathgrip the bars and brakes, and I am frozen in trepidation, indecision and fear. I am trying to walk down sections that are probably safer ridden than walked, but I’m still sore from my double crashes on Saturday, and I can’t bring my body to take another potential hit.

I feel like my brain has failed me, made me weak and timid, all the things my professional education and society have taught me never to be. I’ve managed to increase my FTP by 20 Watts this year, riding with these boys, and I can finally keep up on the climbs with them, though I’m not usually chatty like they are. I can climb or I can talk. I cannot do both. I’ve been keeping up on the descents too, sometimes riding things they won’t. They are no longer stopping for my sake, or to check I’m alive, because they no longer need to. But somewhere along the way, I’ve lost my mojo and I’m desperately hoping to get it back.

We sit at the pub afterward, me quieter than usual, feeling dejected. They attempt to console me, as only boys will, by suggesting a trial of psilocybins, and maybe just riding easier, familiar trails at speed until I feel like myself again. The usual banter resumes thereafter as the pints continue, and I take my leave.

Tomorrow, I will ride with a girlfriend who loves bikes because they get us outside and we can talk about anything and only the trees will hear us. It will be a different type of riding, because riding with the boys and riding with the girls are wholly different experiences.

The lease on my Volvo SUV also ends this fall, and I am looking at a truck for the next vehicle, because baby, when I’m back, I will be riding all the things in all the hidden places and I shall need a truck to get there.

Scattered

Like my brain. My thoughts. My whole world.
I cannot pull it together into something cohesive.

So without any structure, here is what has been happening:

Northern lights. The Aurora showed up again, one late, dark evening, barely visible to the naked eye, but upon capturing it on camera, it was like a secret show.

I took the kids to the pumpkin patch last weekend. They had sunflowers, nearing the end of their season, but it was our last truly warm day and I love when the sky looks so big.

I went to ride bikes with friends. It’s mushroom foraging season. I just liked how cute these ones were, but we found a big pine mushroom that we plucked and put in a pack for later.

These are my bike/mushroom-hunter friends. To say we got distracted was an understatement. I really wanted to ride more. But here they are. Not on bikes. Looking for fungus.

I got my nails done the same colour as my bike grips. Which is to say black with sparkles. Because it makes me happy when I think about my bike.

And this, because you asked, is Skully. He has lost his mandible, because when you’re dead you don’t really need it. No regrets. Every time I see him I smile.

Work has been mentally all-consuming.
The weather has gone cold, the bike park is closed (though I got pretty good closing weekend laps in with a bunch of boys I hardly knew, but they rode all the techy stuff I love), and many of my bike friends are off to less depressing climes as our little pocket of Canada has properly settled in the rainy/cold season. This weekend, an “atmospheric river” has been forecast.

I’m currently on a mission to find a really cool leather motorcycle jacket. Just because. It’s a nice distraction from work. And I am deluded enough to think that I’ll have places to go where I can wear it and it will be a statement piece. I’ve been a little obsessed with finding a vintage Schott Perfecto jacket.

A friend came by to see if he could sort out my smoke alarm that had been chirping at me. I borrowed his extendable ladder to reach the 14 foot ceiling, and after changing the battery, it continued to chirp. The first thing he did? Lick the 9V battery. And lick the other alternates I’d put out and tried as well. I stare at him blankly.
“What, you’ve never licked a battery before??” he asks incredulously.
No… I have never had the inclination. What does it feel like?
“Try it. It’s like a little tingle.”
Well, no, because you’ve just licked all the batteries I’ve laid out.
“Oh. Well, I’m not sick or anything.”
End result: I have not licked any batteries, and I have ordered a new smoke detector after he checked all the wiring and stuff and determined that the detector is almost 10 years old so we’re due for a replacement anyway. He’s a home inspector/helicopter mechanic when he’s being a grownup, so not random advice, but … who knows if licking batteries has any detrimental effects?

I bought my son a used dirt jumper and I can’t wait to hit the dirt jumps and pump track with him next summer!

Tomorrow I am presenting a round table discussion for a rural medicine conference. Am I ready? No. But I have nice nails.

Memento Mori

“Long before the skull was the trademark aesthetic of punk rock bands, motorcycle gangs, or Hollywood pirates, it was the visual motif of Christian monks. For centuries, monks would go into their cells and kneel on prayer benches with three items spread before them: a portion of Scripture, a candle (to read said scripture) and a skull…
The skull was a daily reminder that life is fleeting; don’t miss it.“
~John Mark Comer, Practicing the Way, WaterBrook Press, 2024, pg 67

We are pedaling uphill, sweaty, panting.
“So, what are you going to do about the tattoo?” she asks between breaths.
“I’ve booked it. He said he loved me and didn’t want to be one of those controlling husbands, so I’m taking that as assent.”
Her partner laughs, as he pedals up beside me. His skin is unmarred. Hers, a myriad of ferns, ravens, and a mix of thoughtful and silly things that are all quintessentially her.
She laughs too, and tells me she can’t wait to see how it all turns out.
“It’s way smaller than the one I originally planned! And I’ve reworked the design idea. Simple, fineline work, and not the large complex piece I originally intended to take up a considerable portion of my ribcage. It’s respectfully small. I can still fake being a respectable grownup with it.”
She laughs again.
I had cancelled another appointment weeks earlier with an artist visiting from Asia, losing a chunk of deposit money in the process, as my husband respectfully but vehemently protested the idea I had for a moderately sized complex tattoo of a skull embedded in a peony. I had a little cry about it, then found my peace. My brother sent me numerous images of ideas in the meantime, then told me simply, “Just don’t get something trashy.”
We ride down steep, loamy fall lines in the quiet of a late summer morning, sun filtering through the trees, dirt smelling rich and earthy and moist. It’s a quick lap, and we’ve managed to fit it in before the heat comes in earnest. Early enough to still get some solid work done the rest of the day. Play before work isn’t all bad.

It was a week after her sixtieth birthday, all life and freedom and laughter. Finally, she had come in to her own. She was secure in her self, her role in her family, as a mother, a wife, a sister and a friend. She had learned to laugh loud, with true joy, and nothing held back. She was a social butterfly, going to dinners, shows, and weekend meanders through the city with her similarly vivacious friends. Then suddenly she was in a coma, head shaven, tubes draining the blood-blocked fluid-filled spaces in her brain, while the angry pink incision from her sternum to pubis healed under the staples holding it together.
Gone. All of it. In an instant.
Her memories, her sense of humour, her potential.
She pulled through, suddenly frail, suddenly old, suddenly dependent, with all the travelling and adventure she had dreamed about not even there in memory.

My heart pounds as I hear the rapids over the horizon line. I know my line. Look for the little peaky pyramid wave, head for it, arc right around the hole, paddle hard and straightline it down the middle. The little whorl of recirculating water on the left shouldn’t be an issue with today’s water level. It’s so loud I can’t hear my heart pounding anymore, and suddenly, I’m in it. Am I paddling? Did I freeze? I’m upside down. It’s bubbles and instinct to hold my breath. OPEN YOUR EYES. Focus. Don’t drown today. Set up to roll up. Is this what it feels like to be in a washing machine? Flip the paddle, PULL, arc. I’m up! What direction am I facing? Where do I go? There! Paddle hard! I can’t see! Breathe!
Good God, that was exhilarating.

I can’t be here anymore. This city. These memories. Everything. I feel like I’m suffocating in a vat of simmering anxiety.
“So…your solution is to move across the country? No family. No friends. No supports.”
YES. Start fresh. Everything new and scary and astonishing.
I know what I’m running from and I know what I’m running to, so that must count for something.
I want more than this. I want my life to be fuller than this, and I know I won’t find it here. You know it too. Life is short. This could all be stolen from us in an instant. Let’s go. Who knows when another opportunity will come? Who knows when we’ll be able to take it? I don’t want to regret anything.
It’s still Canada. It’s not like we’re moving across the planet. And we can always move back…
Though I know in my heart we will not.

It’s a stab of pain behind my right knee cap. Each step a knife blade jabbing into my knee. It takes my breath away. We’ve just climbed 10 km, and we’re on the descent. This is a recovery run. Trail marathon is in 2.5 weeks and I’ve just started my taper, pounding out a relaxed 35 km a few days before. Please. No. I’ve worked so hard for this. I hobble out, last one to finish that day. Needles, tape, single leg squats, banded exercises, that little curvy metal scraper thing along my IT band so hard that I yelp in pain. I can’t run 2 km before it starts up again. I pull out of the race, and ride a bare bones, new-to-me bike up a trail all the local little kids warm up with. I’m exhausted at the top of the hill and cry a little as I look out into the valley, a small Inukshuk pointing me toward the best parts of the view.

“Nice bike”, he says with a grin. He’s new to our weekly rides. I’ve not met him before though he knows other people here.
“Yours too,” I reply, matching his grin.
His bike is the bike I once wanted to buy.
Back when it was new and owned by a mutual friend, I told said friend that when it came time for him to sell it, perhaps he would consider selling it to me first. Oxblood red with a shiny topcoat where you could see the carbon fibre pattern of the frame through the paint made for a faceted, elegant look. The gold decals, gold brake levers (for my favourite brakes), and stiffer suspension with its roots in moto riding meant it was also a very beautiful and capable bike.
Said friend jumps in and says to New Guy, “Your bike is the bike she wanted you know.”
“But your bike now is sick!” says New Guy.
“Well, she spent considerably more on it than you did.” He pauses, then chuckles. “Considerably.”
I shush him.
New Guy changes the topic. “It was helpful watching you ride all those features today by the way. Thanks.”
I smile.
Internally, that smile is a mile wide. It’s not every day that I get props from dudes for my riding. I love the trail we rode today. It’s full of big rock slabs that all feel blind when you ride into them. Half of them have technically difficult entrances, so you kind of have to pick your way into it, and then all you see is your front wheel crest the top of a massive rock, and suddenly you’re plunging down a rock face, looking at your exit line and preparing your body to hold on to the chunder that is to come. It’s all a little bit terrifying and thrilling and the adrenaline rush never gets old. One section needs to be ridden slowly, a test of brake control, patience, and balance on a long, stepped slab that leads into a few chunky rocks. People have broken pelvises on that feature. Wrists. Other useful body parts.

No reward without risk.

Mom, you should name it Skully.
Skully? Or Skelly?
Skully.

Skully makes me smile. He (she?) is tucked under my right arm, just distal to my armpit, a spicy spot for a tattoo, or so I’m told. Close enough for me to see and be reminded. That’s all I wanted.
Let’s go sit in the hot tub.
I hear about their new teachers, kids in their class, all the hopes and expectations for the school year to come. My heart is so, so, full.

Life is fleeting; don’t miss it.

Momentous

I can’t recall the last time I had a goal that took an exceptionally long time to achieve. Getting in to medical school, perhaps? But that was somewhat different, because I knew the path I needed to take, I knew the numbers I needed to make. I knew how.

Last week, I did my first backflip on a bike.

About two and a half years ago, on my 41st birthday, I took a little trip to a facility with an airbag. For those who are unfamiliar, it is simply that: a large bag, filled with air. A steep wooden ramp is placed in front of it, usually 6-8 feet high, and one is expected to launch off said ramp with a small bicycle, throw a trick, and land safely on the airbag. If you mess up the trick, no harm, no foul, and you rise to see another day, and try the trick again. Airbags are essential to the safe progression of slopestyle riding.

As there is a fair bit of waiting around at the top for someone to do something and then climb out of the airbag (no easy feat, I assure you) with his bike, there is advice swapping, kudos, and general camaraderie as one waits to drop in for her turn. Bicycling in this capacity is very much a male-dominated realm, and typically for the younger, sturdier ones. I trade a lot of tips with teenage boys to those in their thirties. I also watch a lot of these guys do really amazing tricks.

Tail whips, nac-nacs, truck drivers, t-bogs, suicide no-handers, tuck-no’s, folds, tables, cash rolls, x-ups, bar spins, no footers, nothings, supermans, and all manner of degrees of rotation, either as flat spins or corks or flips. There are women starting to elbow their way into this realm of riding, but even at Red Bull level competition, the female lineup is startlingly small.

All the tricks are super cool to see (and daunting to try), but the first time I saw someone throw a backflip, gracefully arcing through the air while rotating backward, my eyes glazed over with starstruck wonder.

No idea why no other tricks seemed to draw this wonder, but I turned to my friend at the airbag and declared that very day that I was going to do a backflip by the time I was fifty.
Without missing a beat, he said, “Well, it’d be best if you did it well before forty-nine and a half.”
Because good friends will call you out on bullsh*t, and force commitment.

So this year, a local girl opened an airbag facility at the base of the mountain, a mere ten minutes from my house. It’s the same girl who first got me started on dirt jumps to begin with, and of course, I had to support her. She had 6 foot and 8 foot ramps, with the 8 footer dropping you onto a much larger pillow bag. These pillow bags are the first steps in a series of progression before people take tricks to dirt.

I’m at the bag on a weekly basis, and the mulch jumps too, where there is a steep lip that’s probably ten feet, that goes into a step-up (i.e. the landing is taller than the lip of the jump, and the landing is covered in mulch to break any falls). The technicalities of perfecting jumps on these type of ramps takes me hours of practice. It’s all angles and timing and pressure, and a friend, who is also a coach, but happily gives free tips just because he loves it, spends hours filming me and breaking down my movements and body position with every jump. I hike back up and do it again. Again. Again. Where are my elbows pointing? My toes? How far back are my hips? Is my torso parallel to the jump? When do I point my toes in the air? Where are my eyes looking? When I take a limb off the bike, which way do I send it? We want height, not distance. Hang time. That moment of weightlessness where it feels a little bit like you’ve got time to have a cup of tea before gravity pulls you back down. Parabolas.

I get a hematoma the size of a testicle from a handlebar on my thigh that takes me out for a few weeks.
I’m going on regular rides all the while, trying to keep my cardio up, and weight training, trying to maintain strength.

Suddenly, it is mid August, and the niggling feeling that I need to tick this off soon weighs on me. I’m not getting any younger. I’m feeling strong. I’m riding well. Confident. My jumps have been more consistent. Who knows where my risk tolerance will be next year, at 44?

I head to a trampoline centre with my friend who owns the airbag, as she’s been wanting to go and I’ve promised her a lunch date as a birthday gift. We go, and I work on trying to do backflips on the trampoline. I’ve never been a gymnast. I have no idea what backflipping feels like. A young man with a past in freeskiing coaches me through it, and within 2.5 hours, I’ve managed to do them fairly consistently on my own, kneeing myself in the face only once (though a week later, I still have the black eye to show for it). I cannot move my head for about two days afterward, my neck and shoulders are so sore from the effort and the many failed attempts.

The very next day, I go for a birthday ride with that same friend from the airbag two years prior. It’s a long, steep climb, with boys I usually can’t keep up with (especially on legs that have been jumping for hours the day before), but they wait patiently for me as I sweat out my body weight, huffing and puffing up the trail. The descent is steep, gnarly and continuous, and I ride it all, as following strong riders makes everything seem possible. I head to the airbag again that night, but am so tired I do five or six jumps, then get stuck in the bag, too tired to climb out. There is a coach there, aware of my goal, but he doesn’t know me, and gives me the distinct sense he doesn’t think I’m ready. I leave discouraged, then have dinner with girlfriends who tell me that maybe I should reconsider this goal? There’ve been a few cervical spine injuries of friends of friends lately… I am saddened and even more discouraged now.
I stop by the friend’s house I’d ridden with earlier to wish him a happy birthday. We rehash the ride that day, and the disappointing airbag session. As I leave, he yells into the dark, “Backflip this Saturday? We’ll come watch.”

I ride with him and some other friends again on Saturday, and we do not speak of it, but it’s on loop in my head. The summer is coming to an end, and there is a strange anxiety, a strange restlessness that I just need to get this done. Not to be cool. Not to show off, but just because I said I wanted it, and how much would it suck for me to abandon it? Who sets goals to walk away from them?

Saturday night is Ladies Night at the bag. There’s a pro there coaching, but there are enough of us there that her attention is divided. My friend who’s been filming me and coaching me on the side is there too, to watch, to support, to cheer us on. I tell him I need him to walk me through the progression. I have no idea how to approach this type of skill. We’ve spent enough time together this summer that he knows how I learn best, he knows what I’m capable of, and he’s spent ages listening to me go on about how badly I want this.
Another guy, a local bike mechanic and sponsored rider, is there watching his girlfriend, and offers his laid back Aussie stoke and encouragement. I rode with him in Mexico. He is so casual about this, and talks to me like there is no doubt in his mind that this is something I’ll do.

There are at least nine attempts so far. Some I get half-way around and land on my back. Some I land awkwardly on my shoulder in attempts to avoid landing on my head. Some I land front wheel first, then tumble forward. Each attempt is filmed, and each time, my friend breaks down what I did wrong.
“Don’t think too much” he says unironically.
“This trick is a Jesus-take-the-wheel kind of thing. Eyes to the visor, hinge at the hips, press into the end of the lip hard, like you want to knock it over, but you have to do it by feel, because you’ve gotta keep your eyes up, and like magic, you’ll spin. When you’re upside down, pull the bike in to you with arms and legs, point your toes to keep the bike with you, and you’ll ensure you rotate faster to get all the way around. Then just spot your landing.”
I hike back up to the top of the run in. There’s a camera guy filming footage for a promo video. I can tell he is trying to be subtle. My coach friend has climbed a pole and is holding his phone while hanging like a monkey to get a better angle. I block out everyone around me, but the other girls there are yelling encouragement at me, votes of confidence. I take a deep breath and pedal in. I can hear people yelling positive things and the energy is high.

I do it.

I land it.

It’s perfect.

And it feels AMAZING.

I sit on the bag for a moment, a big, stupid grin on my face. I can hear people hollering. I see my coach friend run up to the bag with his phone recording my expression as I get up to get off the bag. He pulls my bike off and gives me a big, hearty hug. I feel like I’ve just won the Olympics.

It took a village. A village of positive people who saw no limits and held high expectations.

And that, my friends, is what goal-setting is all about. 🙂

Still here. Still riding bikes :)

Well, well, well, it’s been a hot minute, hasn’t it? We are 16 stages in to the Tour de France. Yolanda Neff has pulled out of the Olympics. Pidcock’s got Covid and calling it a day. It’s been nearly two months since I’ve posted, and I am not riding nearly enough outdoors.

But I did get a lap in last night. First one in a week.

I also injured myself again a few weeks back. Airbag practice, landed a trick badly and bashed a handlebar into my right thigh. A bit sore, the whole thigh goes purple and black and green, and then, two weeks later, a little collection forms. It’s the size of a half a tennis ball initially, and sore as all get-out. I head to my doctor, who has recently also drained a hematoma from a friend’s thigh after she messed up a suicide-no-hander on a massive jump and went from sky to ground in one fell swoop. My little hematoma is a baby avocado in comparison. My velophile doctor (yes, this town has a problem) tsks, proceeds to stick a very large gauge needle into my thigh and pull out a mere 5 cc’s of fluid, then orders an ultrasound to see if there’s anything else he can get at. By the time I get the ultrasound several days later, the lump on my leg looks convincingly like I’m growing my own misguided testicle.

And so it remains. It doesn’t hurt anymore. It’s just annoying. It is shrinking a bit though. Maybe.

But I can pedal. Last night, after being cooped up trying to catch up on mountains of work the past week, after a hectic clinic day, and coordinating all manner of kid camp and pickups/drop offs, I got out for a lap with the Monday Night crew.

I’m the teeny one at the back middle. It’s a much bigger crew than usual, with a girl I don’t know from a neighbouring town, and a few guys I’ve not met before too. Mostly, I’m just stoked there’s another girl. (The past year, it’s been me and one other. And before that, it was just me.) The trail chosen is one I really enjoy, but it’s a long way from our meet up spot, so we’re pushing hard to ensure we get the descent in before sunset. This is not unusual for the group, and is perhaps one of the primary reasons I train so hard: to keep up. And to carry my own bike for the hike a bike. Bumped my heart rate threshold up again with this ride…

It’s the first time riding the trail for a few of the group, and the one big feature ends up being full of fist bumps and encouragement, with no carnage.

We finish the trail and end up on a weird connector that I never ride but it flows in big cruisy turns through the trees. We are all riding fast and someone is making motorcycle noises and someone is whoop-whooping and suddenly we all screech to a halt to let a little yearling bear scamper by while scanning to ensure no mumma bear is near. Then we resume our zooming through the forest and I just want to say that I love love LOVE this little crew of bike nerds riding in a train, weaving through the trees with silly grins and sweaty shirts.

I’m properly starving by the end of what ends up being a solid 2.5 hour ride and it’s that familiar burny/hollow/dead feeling in my legs because I only had a single water bottle and it was 30C+ degrees with no snacks. I have a burger and lemonade at 10 pm and leave the boys at the pub in favour of a shower and to crash happily into bed, exhausted and fully sated.

There are few things that can compare to this feeling: the perfect mix of adrenaline high, fatigue and fullness.

What a way to start a week eh?

I would like more bike rides and less work please.

It’s that time of year again, where the sun peeps over the mountains at 5 am. I wake, whether I want to or not, regardless of the time I went to bed, regardless of the fatigue I may have let ooze into my orthopedic pillow as I drifted off to sleep the night prior.

I open my eyes to a narrow squint, narrower than most because I am Asian, and fumble for my phone to check the time.

I sigh. Too bloody early.

But it’s too late. The squint triggered the brain, and the creaky machinations begin, picking up speed, so that despite my best efforts to squeeze my eyes shut and force the machine to pause, I am alert and planning all that needs to be done.

Well, might as well get up and get a workout in then.

The first five minutes of pedaling are slow, with leaden legs and a body clawing its way out of sleep. I like one particular instructor on Peloton these days, a cheery, blond boy, probably late twenties, with a mild underbite and boy-next-door innocence in his mispronunciations of band names like INXS and Duran Duran. He coaches power zone training, and today, I’ve chosen an endurance ride that will focus on zone three intervals, knowing that I’ll likely head out for another outdoor ride later in the day, and I need to save a little in the tank.

Forty-five minutes in and I’m drenched in sweat, feeling alive and pushing hard. It feels good, and I’m looking forward to the day. It’s incredible what endorphins are capable of.

I do a little work as I down my green smoothie. I’ve got it down to a rhythm now, these work from home days. Workout, shower, smoothie, coffee, poop.

A series of texts later, and I’m meeeting some friends at the local composting/soil facility. We have to weave through mounds of stinky compostables and then bigger mounds of rich, moist earth before we hit a service road with a steady climb. In this area are some technically demanding trails, and two, shorter trails that are good value fun. They’re inconvenient to get to, and thus, usually a quiet pedal where we’re unlikely to see anyone else. It’s raining, and warm. It feels mildly like pedaling in a greenhouse. We head down the first trail and it’s good fun, “Just the right amount of rowd”, says the Scot. The two other Brits I’m riding with whoop in agreement, until suddenly, we pull up to a rock we can’t see over.

Ah, I remember this rock. It’s been about a year since I last rode this trail, but I remember it was long with a turn on it. I suggest we get off to look at it and test the grip, because I don’t remember the line, and the last time I rode it was in the dry.

We walk the length of it, looking for places to slow down, for potential places we’d slide out, noting the smooth, muddy slab on the exit, then a few rolling plunges into masses of slick roots.

The Scot goes first, and manages to ride it beautifully: slow, controlled and perfect.

One of the Brits peering down the trail nods at me to go after the Scot has cleared it. It’s a deep breath, and slow creep onto the rock. Brake modulation is everything, and I am conscious of my body position, ensuring there is enough weight on the front wheel, reminding myself that I have to lean in to this, like all things in life, to optimize control.

I ride it, and as I let fly at the end, smile of accomplishment spreading and adrenaline rushing, I pull over to await the rest of our group.
I yell at the Scot, “My heart rate is at 160!!!”
He’s a numbers nerd too, and we are the only two tracking our metrics today.
He laughs.

I guess I maxed out at 167 on that little slab. I suppose I could just scare myself every day to get my cardio in.

Well, it really is fun. I promise. Bulging neck vein and look of trepidation aside.

We head up for another lap on the loamer trail beside the first and get pinballed around in the weird corners and angled roots. It’s fast and fun and we all high-five before riding back through the stinking piles of dirt and rotting organics to get to our vehicles.

It’s barely noon. Perfect, I’ll get some work done before the kids come home from school.

But then, I clean my bike and body, have a feed, and now I’m on the couch, staring at my computer screen, eyes glazing over, trying to read a file. My elderly dog grumbles a bit, then snuggles into my thigh before promptly falling asleep.

Before long, I am asleep too.

And now, it’s 930 at night and I’m exhausted, having done perhaps only thirty minutes of actual work in the past eight hours.

Guess I’ll have to catch up over the weekend.

Worth it. 🙂

Bits and Bobs and Nerdery

My bottom bracket is creaking, and something feels…gritty. It feels yucky when I pedal, and I can’t describe it any better than that, but that there’s a subtle vibration I can feel and I don’t like it.
I’m like the princess and the pea, a delicate snowflake who cannot handle the weird rub felt with every pedal stroke.
I write my mechanic friend to complain, and immediately, a photo of a new bottom bracket is sent to me.
I roll my eyes, because of course he’s going to just tell me to get a new one.
Oh, but wait. I look closer.
It’s BLUE.
Well now..
I had forgotten about this. He’d done a big order months ago, and here it was.

I head over after a long day at work because he’s going traveling for a bit and I’ll have no one to help me fix my bike for a few months. I whine about my injuries, and how I’ve been off my bike for over a week.

If you recall, I built my dream bike last August. Every little accent was thought about, from hub to widget to grip cuff. I have a thing for blue anodized bits, and I don’t mind (much) that companies can’t seem to get colour consistency right. I love all things blue and shiny. I have yet to put the blue rotor bolts on, but there are so many little blue things to do!

The old BB is removed and indeed, the bearings are worn and the princess was not hallucinating. The grease is an odd brownish grey and smells a little rancid. I gag a little, all is wiped clean, and the new BB is installed.

Like a magician, said mechanic friend produces a small ring.

My eyes widen with glee. When these pre-load adjusters came out, they came out in a plethora of beautiful colours. I had sent the marketing photo to him to ogle. He’s ordered a few on whim, suspecting I might want one, even when I’d said I ought not.
“But,” my heart saddens, “it’s the wrong blue! You’d think the company could get their own anodizing in order.”
This piece would sit right next to the BB, highlighting the colour discrepancy, so I decide not to put it on. No matter, there is surely another bike this little ornament will brighten.

Then, more magic.

I feel like a kid who’s favourite uncle (only he’s younger than me) just keeps pulling out more toys from the toolbox. They’ve been out of stock forever on these. I don’t know how long this little guy has been tucked in the toolbox, but now it’s MINE.

This little doodad holds the brake cable to the fork, like so.

It’s ALL ABOUT THE LITTLE THINGS! I am squeaking internally with excitement. Internally because, get a hold of yourself Crusty, you are a professional.
Also a bash guard, fresh rubber, front and back, and in doing so, new valve cores, and a new stem cap for the front tire that has this nifty little hole in it so that you can use the cap to extract valve cores without hunting around for pliers. Also, all blue. Of course, of course.

It is dark by the time I leave, and I am feeling a bit better about my shoulder and hamstring tendon pain limiting me from riding, aggravated by sitting all day at work. I have a physio appointment in the morning, and I am extra motivated now to get sorted so I can ride the bike again.

This physio is known in town for being a good one, if not a bit stern, so I’m a bit nervous when I meet her, but she is lovely, and knows just where to dig her fingers in to my shoulder and my butt to release things. After what feels like fifteen needles into my hip and thigh, each one yielding a satisfying/horrifying spasm upon insertion, I’m sore for a bit, then pain free. I leave with a list of tedious exercises to build hamstring tendon load tolerance, and a warning not to strain it suddenly as I’ll delay recovery.

A friend messages me to ride with her, and I pause.
No punchy climbs, steady cadence climbing with no standing?
Sure, we’ll take it easy.

No gnar, just meadows of happy yellow wildflowers and glorious sunshine.

All is well in my little bubble today.

Coming of Age

These days, it means something different.

It’s been two weeks, and my left shoulder and right glute still hurt. I took rest days, cut my training load in half, and today, in my attempts to do *some* strength training, realized that I am still a gimpy bag of joints. I tried to ride a trail I know well a couple days ago and felt a twang in the glute, a jab of pain, and for the rest of the descent, was painfully aware that I do not recover like I once did, feeling hesitant on lines I’ve thundered down without a thought in the past.

About a month ago, there was a big fundraiser gala. Black tie, so I put on a long dress, did my hair and put on makeup. I got my nails done, and when choosing a colour, the girl at the salon voted a bright vampy red.
“Heck no.” I reply. I choose a darker red, called Malaga Wine.
If you’ve never been to a nail salon, the best thing about it is the names of the kaleidescope of bottles in front of you, mounted to Lilliputian acrylic shelves on the wall. Someone creative or eternally bored gets paid to think of these names, and that thought gives me joy.

I get ready with my friend, and she sees my nails and says, “Oooh, that’s Rich Lady Red. Nice choice.” Malaga Wine is something a Rich Lady would drink I guess.
Ha. Tonight, I think, I will pull it off.
It’s a proper fundraising gala, with oodles of the uber-rich who have come up from the city for the art auction. Locals are there to network, unless you’re me, and happen to be besties with a partner at a law firm that represents the gallery. Then you’re just freeloading and it’s good times for all.
“Um.. aren’t you supposed to be inviting clients?”
“Yeah, but I want to have FUN.”
It’s a proper auction, with people waving big ol’ numbered squares, bidding tens of thousands for a picture of a fluorescent lizard with a mohawk, or that strange stack of blocks. It is really, really strange. I keep thinking the money should go to way more practical things, and that it’s silly to put that expensive stack of blocks into your vacation home that you never go to, but I digress.
I’ve had too much to drink to carry on this conversation with the wife of the chancellor of something and I’ve already forgotten her name, but how many times is too many to ask again? Also, Rich Lady Red does not extend to my toes, and I’ve had to take my shoes off because this whole high heels thing is really misery doled out by the patriarchy right? Besides, this place is classy and carpeted and surely there is no sloppy drunk breaking glassware at a black tie event?

I call it a night by 11 pm, but my friend gets back at 3 am and attempts to make Kraft Dinner. For all her talents as a lawyer, she is equal parts ineptitude in the kitchen. (Truly, even when sober.)

Here you see the Rich Lady Red, and the way I found the butter in the morning.

The next day is full of electrolytes, naps on the couch, greasy egg and bacon sandwiches (bought, of course), and a long walk to the spit and back. She is leaving town soon, to be with her partner on the other side of the country.

It’s a common story: best friend moves away, there is sorrow and wistful waving out the back of the car window as they fade into the distance.
But it’s different now, because we are in our forties and this is not new. We have each been through our own many losses and triumphs, and this is not forever, and we have telecommunications and air travel and means.

But it’s different now also because we are in our forties, and this is not new, and we know how this could end.
We know that people get busy and lose touch. We know that people drift, or sometimes surprise die on you. We know that in our forties, making and keeping good friends is hard.
We had the benefit of knowing each other for five months (and getting along famously) at fifteen, then losing touch for seventeen years, then serendipitiously meeting again. We had the luck of our partners getting along well, and sharing close friendship as couples and individually. This kind of friendship is rare, where you really truly like each other through and through, and have all been through enough therapy to move on past the things that annoy you. There are maybe three people in my life that I have this kind of friendship with, and I’ll be damned if they don’t all live far away now.

The ligaments in my neck and shoulder are telling me to wrap this up.
So tomorrow I will distract myself with work, which sucks up all my time for friendships anyway, and when the sun comes out next week, I’ll be doing boring physio exercises because my shoulder and my @ss refuse to settle down to just let me have my therapeutic biking, because I am an old creaky house.
JUST LET ME HAVE IT, please.
I’m not getting any younger.

F.T. frickin’ P

I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.

Don’t, actually. I don’t want to know.
I did a five week power zone training program and tested at the beginning and at the end, and my FTP actually dropped. I got all in my head about it, until I went for a lap with some friends who then reminded me that on a mountain bike, it means nothing, because we never ride at cadences like that, and FTP tells you nothing about how effectively you pumped the corner or thundered through the rock garden to keep speed on a downhill lap.

On Sunday, I raced my first race of the season. I came last in my age category, but I don’t feel bad about it because I raced the entire first stage blind, and the latter three stages I’d ridden once each, all about two weeks before race day so I took all the wrong lines. I generally struggle to remember what happened this morning so it’d be some luck for me to remember race lines 14 days away. It was also greasy slick after a hard night’s rain so it’s a wonder I came out of it in one piece, until I didn’t. Crashed 200 m before the finish line on a flat breakaway. I was coming in too hot, touched a brake but I guess my body position was too far forward and I went for a high speed somersault into the brush. I’m a bit bruised, but no worse for wear. It cost me a good few minutes though, with medics asking a lot of questions before letting me get back on the bike, and has resulted in me feeling generally old and decrepit.

All in all a fun time though. I’ve been feeling strong with my training, and if it weren’t for the crash, I felt pretty good for the whole thing.
I started the day riding with the Masters Men category, instead of the women, because I didn’t know anyone else doing the race aside from three male riding buddies, and 4+ hours on a bike where 80% of that is climbing is pretty miserable to do alone. So we had a grand time. I tried to keep up, mostly, while listening to their banter. We lost one after stage 2 to cramps, discovering he was gone after we’d gotten to the top, only to catch him later at apres, telling the tale of how his hamstrings and quadriceps cramped in tandem, effectively leaving him a stiff-legged heap in the woods, waiting for his electrolytes and water to kick in so he could stretch.

I’ve got another race on Saturday but I might have to pull out if the shoulder isn’t feeling a bit less sore. It has to be at a soreness level where the number of painkillers required to make me forget about it has to be below the number of painkillers that will make me tired or slow. A delicate ratio.

I took two days off for full rest, doing only mobility and stretching work, until today, when I put in an hour of endurance training. But I really would rather be riding outside. The grey skies on the days I can actually ride outdoors, in contrast to the work days where it’s sunny and glorious, only serve to add insult to injury.

We are three days out, and I still haven’t washed my bike or taken off the race plate from Sunday. This is a testament to my current mental state. I came home post race and did two hours of work. Yesterday, after a 12 hour clinic day, I made dinner and cleaned and then did another hour of work. I am running on 5 hours sleep, but have done three loads of laundry and am procrastinating on the three reports I have ahead.

I’ll write properly again maybe, when I’m not so overwhelmed with work and the constancy, volume, and perpetual nature of it. I suppose I ought to be grateful.

Off I go, then.

Ah, dear Daughter.

It is dark, and the house is quiet as I rouse from sleep, bleary-eyed, and stumble out of bed to wake my children. Saturday mornings in some households are lazy, slow days with the cozy smell of coffee, and sizzling eggs and bacon. In ours, a ski-school schedule beckons, and it being a weekend means that all the city folk will descend upon our town, clogging up the highway and the mountain parking lots, feeding our tourism economy, and necessitating ridiculously early arrivals to the mountain to find parking.

My children put their base layers and winter gear on. It will be warm today, after our recent cold snap, so fewer layers are donned. We quietly sneak to the kitchen so Dad can sleep a while longer, and I get a bowl of oats into each of the kids and load up the car. We are at the mountain 40 minutes before open, so I’ve got a decent parking spot, but a lift lineup is already forming. My kids take their time putting on their gear, and my son jogs over to his snowboard group while my daughter and I get in line. As we await the lift open, my daughter dips into a negative headspace.

“I hate skiing. I don’t even know why we’re here. This town is stupid. Skiing is stupid. I wish I could go home.”
I’m surprised. Earlier, we were talking about what we were going to ski today, what snacks we’d get. I was excited to get to spend time with her, just the two of us, as we don’t often get the chance anymore. I tell her this, and remind her that she agreed to come.
“Well, I didn’t really have a choice, did I?” she retorts. She glances at me with a side-eye through her low-light lens goggles, and even under all her gear, her usually beautiful face is hell and thunderclouds.

It’s grey out, with a dense fog mid-mountain where we’re standing. The gondola starts to move and the lineup shuffles along.
Maybe it’s my chronic lack of sleep, but my daughter’s sudden change of heart and tone of voice slices deep. I feel tears well up, and my mind envisions a bleak future where we are estranged, my daughter hating me, and I am bundled up in a nursing home blanket remembering her sweet little face at a time when we used to adore each other.
No, I can’t let that happen. I have to keep our relationship positive. Also, get your sh*t together, who’s the adult here??

I’m disappointed, I tell her, at her change of heart.
Then I stare at her with a goofy face on, trying to get her to break.
She side-eyes me again. Her face is stone.
I admire her misery and resolve. It reminds me of myself.
I propose that after we get to the top of the gondola, we ski to the chair, and head to the very top for a hot chocolate and a snack. Then we could wait for the rest of the mountain to open, and take her preferred terrain down. She grudgingly agrees.

As we sit down for hot chocolate, her mood shifts, and suddenly, we are discussing her plans for a Youtube channel, all the silly things that happened in class yesterday, her teacher and his funny antics. She is a flood of stories and enthusiasm. She pauses.
“Maybe I was just hungry…,” she smiles at me apologetically. “Maybe oats aren’t enough.”
I look her pointedly. “You hurt me kiddo. It made me really sad, when you were talking to me like that.”
She mouths, “I’m sorry”, as if saying it out loud is too embarassing, and in her normal voice, announces that we ought to get skiing.

All her favourite zones are now open, but she knows that if we go to 7th Heaven we’ll likely end up doing an extra lap, and she wants to get home sooner to talk to a friend about their youtube channel ideas. Crystal chair it is. The snow isn’t great today anyway, the weather shifted too suddenly.

The chair stops unexpectedly for a few minutes and she muses, “It’s so peaceful up here.” I look at her in surprise. She’s looking at the spectacular view that surrounds us, breathing in the mountain air. It’s always quiet up this high.
Yeah, it is, isn’t it?

We ski a long, fast lap down and are soon back at the car.
As we take off our skis, she says with a smile, “Well, that was fun!”
It’s like the whole forty minutes of misery earlier that morning didn’t exist for her. Am I crazy? Did I imagine it?
I look at her incredulously. “Say that again?”
She catches herself smiling, then laughs and shakes her head.

I’m thinking I can probably convince her to do this again with me next Saturday. One lap, two, whatever. Time is fleeting, and I’ll take what I can get. Who knows how much worse it could be? She’s only ten. I theoretically have at least another 7-8 years of adolescent attitude to wade through and I really, really don’t want to mess it up.