Sounds like you are in Halifax now! We live close to Willow Park, and there is a fair bit of good riding to be had around here. Welcome back to riding. I managed to go from 215 to 165 pounds from riding more/again and eating somewhat decently. It’s great when you start to see the changes. Keep at it!
I have a couple of clothes racks in my apartment. well actually, they’re bicycles, but for the last few years they’ve served as clothes racks.
I’ve looked at both of them a few times over those few years and was able to conjure up images of me straddling one of them and flying down Fitzpatrick mountain or screaming through the trails in Barney’s river and such thoughts always brought back a smorgasbord of emotions, like happiness, satisfaction, excitement, pride, fellowship and more.
At one time, I was what you might call an avid cyclist. I had in my possession a road bike, a hard tail mountain bike and a dualie, and I would never let one feel neglected…well, sometimes their maintenance was neglected a bit, but that was only because I was either riding, resting up for a big ride or resting up from a big ride. In short, I lived to bike and biked to live.
Life happens, and it happened to me. A new job, in a new city, my whole routine thrown like clay onto a potters wheel. The problem was that I was no potter, and as happy as I was with my new life, It wasn’t really created with maximum input from me, I just sort of let it happen. Another year passes and I get married and that’s a whole 'nuther kettle of fish. Suffice to say that my biking life was left behind.
But I stil had those bicycle cum clothes racks and that, it seems was a saving grace.
Three weeks ago my wife started a new job. The logistics of the whole thing is such that she busses to work and does not get back home until two hours after I do.
Have you ever been given free time rather unexpectedly? It’s like “what do I do now?” Woohoo!! Free time!! I watched every episode of Deadwood on demand in the first week.
Now what?
Then it hit me. Maybe I could do something about this huge mass I have growing between my neck and my nether regions. Man boobs may seem like a good thing in theory, but there not really as fun as the other variety.
enter the clothes racks which I shall now begin to call by their proper names, HT, Dualie, and roadie.
one day last week I rushed home from work to rekindle my relationships with those poor neglected perambulators. I managed to find some cycling shorts, a shirt, shoes, hydra pack, repair kit…all the fixin’s. I pumped up the knobbies on my dualie (the one closest to riding condition). I put lots of air in them because I knew that there was no way I was going to be doing anything close to off-roading, and off I went down the hallway into the elevator, across the lobby and out the door. I could not even wait until I crossed the twelve feet or so to the street proper. I jumped on and coasted down the short grade to the road, trying to get a feel for my old friend. On reaching the sidewalk I grabbed what should have been a hand-full of breaks and…nothing. AAAGGGHH!!!
My mind went racing back to my earlier frantic search for clothes and tools, trying to remember if I had seen a bleed kit. Nothing. Back inside, across the lobby, up the elevator and down the hall for a few more minutes of searching before I had a thought. Bikes by Dave is just up the road, maybe he’s still open (it’s about 5:30 by this time) and maybe he can be convinced to bleed my brakes for me. On the first point I hit paydirt. The shop was still open. On the second point however my plans came to an ignominious end. “We can do it first thing in the morning” the bearded fellow said. so there I was, fat belly and man boobs sticking out of my sporty black cycling jersey. Cycling shoes and camel back now seeming like some extreme fashion faux-pas, and my plans for sapping what energy I had left after an eight hour day now in ruins. I went home feeling a bit disappointed but also kind of excited. I had made the attempt. I had crossed the Rubicon. I felt like I was on my way to svelteness.
The next day I stopped into the bike shop and picked up my bike, went home and changed and peddled for about forty five minutes and felt a twinge of that old feeling. That certainly wasn’t the only twinge I felt, after all I am a fifty year old who has been relatively sedentary for the past three or four years, but thats another story for another time, the point is that I feel like I am now, again, a biker.
I’ve been biking every other day since that first ride and now look forward to saddle time. I hope to be in good enough shape to tackle Fitz again soon but even if I need to face the possibility of crusher dust trails for the remainder of my biking life, I will accept that as a price of growing old.
Hope to see all my old friends again soon and to make some new ones.
Welcome back to the bike! You’re not the only one who’s fallen victim to life getting in the way, believe me. I think we should celebrate your recent rebiking and my recent hopes of finally getting the mountain bike out of the barn with a slow and social ride reaaaal soon.
For sure - and a great place and time to get in a social ride is at SportWheels in Lr. Sackville on Tuesday nights! We meet at the shop, drule over bikes for a few minutes and then decide where to go then head out around 7 and ride until dark (or turn on the lights after dark)! Come on along!!! We have women an men of all ages (from a couple of 11-year-olds to 50-year-olds like me!). Following the ride some go out for Chinese food but I’m a little too round in the middle to eat that late…
Sorry BG, I was able to figure out how to initiate a conversation
but I couldn’t figure out how to send (I was using my phone) . I
was going to ask what you had in mind Re: slow social ride. I’m up
for it anyway :-).
Dirthound, I will keep the Tuesday night rides in mind, thanks
glad to see you’ve found the bike again I was just asking about you the other day