'A' game my ass. Don't get me wrong but I couldn't capitalise on my physical resilience with some mental strength today. 100k swooping through the southeast with 170 fellow cycling nutjobs should have been a doddle but my pride got in the way. I had everything sorted but half way through the event he showed up....You know the guy, right? Am I moving too fast? Ok, breathe... lets start at the start.
I can be vindictive. Cross me and I'll not forget. Might be something cutting you said in passing or a look you gave me you know you really shouldn't have. Cross my wife or kids and you're dust. I've really tried to work on it, letting it go etc. In fact there's people talking to me today that would not a few years ago. Over in the old Saint Mary's Abbey in New Ross there's a Leper's squint in the wall of the North transept. The leper's colony in the town (Norman soldiers had brought the disease back from the Holy Land during the last Crusades) would go to the tiny hole in the wall to receive communion, being forbidden to mix with the general population. At one point half a dozen years ago I felt like that leper, the focus of a condescending attitude from a coterie of cyclists I had once known well. And in today's event a particular scenario came flooding back as I ran into one of those self-same dudes. I don't know how much you understand about cycling but it's about conserving energy as long as possible. A few years ago I found myself only a few kilometres from home in a small group dropped by the leaders. The gap was only a hundred metres and on a false flat, three out of four of us were trying to bridge, each giving it everything. And this one guy told us he was cooked. Couldn't contribute. I rode on like a demon possessed, alarm bells ringing because the same dude was putting in savage training every week. We got to within fifty feet of the group but they were starting to pull away again. I did one last savage turn and expected honesty from the others when, out of nowhere,the non-contributing 'cooked' lad shot out from my slipstream and sprinted across the gap to the disappearing leaders. I blew spectacularly and limped home. And stored that away in my hard drive.
Today, 65km into the ride, on a serpentine, flooded back road, whom did I find myself in the company of? Mr 'I'm cooked' from yesteryear. I pushed myself hard and followed him in the gutters for the next few sections of the course. Indeed I pushed myself too hard in order to position myself well for the final few climbs. I made sure to hold back a little and certainly not contribute to his pace. My heart rate peaked at 188 on the climb after he was dropped. I needed to copper-fasten his demise but my efforts were signalling my own. My legs locked like Brinks in the final few minutes but by then I believed I'd delivered some karma for past misdemenours. Yet I'm sitting here feeling petty. Shouldn't I be all Zen and forgive and forget? Shouldn't I be the better person? Maybe. But sometimes you gotta right the ship when its been listing a long time.
I feel ashamed in one way to have finished today's ride in such a manner. Hadn't I had a ball catching up with the friends that always respected me? Hadn't I felt like a fleet God in the bunch all day? Wasn't it a Belgian-toothpaste-handlebar-licking-morale-lifting beauty of a ride before my pride? Yes it was. Maybe I'll pop over to the Abbey tomorrow instead of cycling and ask for forgiveness and tolerance.
Sunday, January 28, 2018
Monday, January 22, 2018
See you Sunday. Bring your A game.
A minute turns into an hour, turns into a day, turns into a week... a month and then it's a year. Where was I at a year ago? Peering at a dystopian computer screen full of silver and white shades having a well-broken elbow pointed out to me in post-mortem, post x-ray detail. A Morgan Freeman voice; "This son, is it. You've had it." But I knew I hadn't. I knew I'd do something. I wasn't going to be a God, like Mathew Hayman, winning Paris-Roubaix after 6 weeks on a home-trainer. But I would come back. I would not die as a sportsperson and take up golf. All due respect to my fifty year old peers playing golf but I can't respect that. Argyle only sits well on Travellers and 19th-hole-graduates and last time I looked I wasn't either of those. I refuse to talk handicaps and Gant.... I can always run, or walk, or hike, or... you get it. Not golf.☠ Did I mention I don't like golf?!
So this week I find myself in the privileged position of once more looking forward to the first event of the year in good, healthy form. Fingers and all sorts of bits crossed like a squid doing Pilates. A year ago the veil had come down and I'd already sunk into an overwhelming darkness. Affectionately known as the abyss. A broken elbow just as I was starting to hum in training. I was so happy just before I fell. So, so content. Rotten luck. I'm back now. My goals may have shifted to a long-view, racing, sun-holiday with the bike etc. but I'm here.
And I'm counting my blessings in every sense. I didn't fracture something important such as my skull or someone else's life. I'm thankful the Egyptian lady in charge of A+E took a shine to me and fast-tracked me out of what is carnage on a daily basis. I'm blessed my wife didn't put her foot down when really she had the right to. I'm glad I've regained full function and also got over that sea-fog of anaesthetic. If I'd hit the fentanyl I'd be dead by now. Instead I had no pain and I'm super grateful to the Flandrian in my DNA for that. I'm glad I was awakened to the caring few as opposed to the disingenuous multitude. Those I trust could now be counted on one (slightly inbred) hand.
And do I have a beautiful message, like Jesus with a bunch of misfits at his feet, somewhere in Galilee? Why yes, yes I do. Seize it. Seize it all before squinting eyes or early-onset-Alzheimer's or heartbreak or realization or circumstances beyond our control rob us of the right or ability to do it all anymore. Conquer before the tide turns against us. And if that doesn't sound like Jesus, then... seize life and don't hurt a soul in the process. Get what you can from life before it knocks on your door looking for something in return. For it will not be pretty.
So this week I find myself in the privileged position of once more looking forward to the first event of the year in good, healthy form. Fingers and all sorts of bits crossed like a squid doing Pilates. A year ago the veil had come down and I'd already sunk into an overwhelming darkness. Affectionately known as the abyss. A broken elbow just as I was starting to hum in training. I was so happy just before I fell. So, so content. Rotten luck. I'm back now. My goals may have shifted to a long-view, racing, sun-holiday with the bike etc. but I'm here.
And I'm counting my blessings in every sense. I didn't fracture something important such as my skull or someone else's life. I'm thankful the Egyptian lady in charge of A+E took a shine to me and fast-tracked me out of what is carnage on a daily basis. I'm blessed my wife didn't put her foot down when really she had the right to. I'm glad I've regained full function and also got over that sea-fog of anaesthetic. If I'd hit the fentanyl I'd be dead by now. Instead I had no pain and I'm super grateful to the Flandrian in my DNA for that. I'm glad I was awakened to the caring few as opposed to the disingenuous multitude. Those I trust could now be counted on one (slightly inbred) hand.
And do I have a beautiful message, like Jesus with a bunch of misfits at his feet, somewhere in Galilee? Why yes, yes I do. Seize it. Seize it all before squinting eyes or early-onset-Alzheimer's or heartbreak or realization or circumstances beyond our control rob us of the right or ability to do it all anymore. Conquer before the tide turns against us. And if that doesn't sound like Jesus, then... seize life and don't hurt a soul in the process. Get what you can from life before it knocks on your door looking for something in return. For it will not be pretty.
Sunday, January 21, 2018
Where were you at 7am???
I like feeling alive. I like that ain't nobody up at 6am on a Sunday. I like my two coffees as I catch up on a bike mag. I like locking the front door behind me at 7am and slipping off into what is still the night. I like heading down onto the main street and going the wrong direction, avoiding the broken glass outside the closed and blacked-out pubs. I don't like the discarded chicken-boxes and detritus from the Kebabish strewn at the mouths of lanes and doorways like terrible, random art installations.
I liked the rain this morning. I liked feeling dry apart from a stray dribble of road-water sifting down my chin occasionally. I liked the fantails of water arching up and away from my lights. I liked feeling that someone was trying to get up out of bed to emulate me at that moment but heard the rain and thought wiser of it.
I liked passing a lime-kiln and imagining Noah standing into it's hearth cursing the rivers of God's tears wending manically downhill. I imagined nodding and winking and heading onwards. I liked the sounds of drains and channels choking up with the deluge. I did not like the long puddles before first light for fear I'd forgotten a pot-hole or road-cut that could ambush me. I really liked the pre-dawn gloom forcing itself out through a dismal, foreboding sky that boomed "NOT today!"
I liked meeting not a soul for what felt like an eternity but was really an hour. Then the workers in cars getting back on the treadmill of life spoiled the moment now and then like sharing a cave with fireflies. I liked the silence near Thomastown, the empty fields and run-off that put paid to farm work. I liked seeing the same mare and foal, their backs covered with blue canvas, standing in a gateway, looking bewildered as I passed twice.
I disliked heading south, tired after the hard work, an hour of surviving ahead. But I liked the idea of the kids being up now, wife too, the happiness of disturbia. I liked the Ferry Hill knowing I was back to town, now that the chipper food and glass would be swept up and the café on the corner would be filling.
I liked returning as though I'd gotten away with something. I liked the look of those few people up and about wondering who did I think I was?
I liked unlocking the front door and stepping inside with a story to tell.
I liked the rain this morning. I liked feeling dry apart from a stray dribble of road-water sifting down my chin occasionally. I liked the fantails of water arching up and away from my lights. I liked feeling that someone was trying to get up out of bed to emulate me at that moment but heard the rain and thought wiser of it.
I liked passing a lime-kiln and imagining Noah standing into it's hearth cursing the rivers of God's tears wending manically downhill. I imagined nodding and winking and heading onwards. I liked the sounds of drains and channels choking up with the deluge. I did not like the long puddles before first light for fear I'd forgotten a pot-hole or road-cut that could ambush me. I really liked the pre-dawn gloom forcing itself out through a dismal, foreboding sky that boomed "NOT today!"
I liked meeting not a soul for what felt like an eternity but was really an hour. Then the workers in cars getting back on the treadmill of life spoiled the moment now and then like sharing a cave with fireflies. I liked the silence near Thomastown, the empty fields and run-off that put paid to farm work. I liked seeing the same mare and foal, their backs covered with blue canvas, standing in a gateway, looking bewildered as I passed twice.
I disliked heading south, tired after the hard work, an hour of surviving ahead. But I liked the idea of the kids being up now, wife too, the happiness of disturbia. I liked the Ferry Hill knowing I was back to town, now that the chipper food and glass would be swept up and the café on the corner would be filling.
I liked returning as though I'd gotten away with something. I liked the look of those few people up and about wondering who did I think I was?
I liked unlocking the front door and stepping inside with a story to tell.
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