A BIKE RIDE TOO FAR WITH DUBIOUS REWARDS

A good bike ride is a cause for celebration and a good bike makes all the difference.

Better yet, a good bike seat makes all the difference.

But there’s more: bike shorts with a big old pad, water and food for a longer ride, and the determination to finish what you started.

That last part is a given if you ride hard and solo. You can’t stop because you might not start again. If you want to make it home, buckle down.

Some riders carry the question of how far is too far in one stretch.

I found the answer one Sunday.

My life in Portland started at the Trailways Bus terminal in Old Town. After three days, starting in the Greyhound terminal in NYC’s Port Authority on the west side, three days straight with a few quick stops, I was a free man.

I’d met people in New York who didn’t want to live there anymore, but were stuck. They waited too long to move. It was either a great job they couldn’t leave, meeting someone special who didn’t want to leave, or general complacency toward life with the attitude of, “this is as good a place as any where.”

That last bit is the ass kicker because the longer you stay someplace, the more comfortable you get, the less likely you are to change.

In addition, the longer you live in the city the more numb you grow to the noise, the dirt, the crowds. It all becomes normal, but not an exciting new normal.

NY is old normal with streams of new people coming in, and fed-up people moving out.

I wasn’t fed-up, I had just done enough time to call it good.

Why Live In New York At All

I got there as an excuse to avoid going home after my love life took a downturn.

I’d moved from Eugene to the east coast to start a new life with an east coast woman. The problem was self-esteem: She was confused about why anyone would pick up and start over because of her.

Her confusion led to my confusion about our future. Apparently we didn’t have one and I wasn’t willing to admit it. I’d seen signs, but no red flags, then suddenly everything was a red flag. Or maybe it was just me.

Either way, I wasn’t going home confused by the way things turned out and picking up where I left off. Oh no, I was a big boy so I did the big boy thing and moved to the Big Apple. I had help from my cousin Debbie who had an extra room in Brooklyn.

After meeting new people in the neighborhood and at work, I realized I could make a life there by fading into the concrete with everyone else who couldn’t leave, who didn’t have anyplace else to go.

To them, NYC was ground zero and everyplace else was ‘out there.’

They didn’t know ‘out there’ but I did, and that’s where I was going before it got too late. I had help moving to Portland, too, from a college friend looking for her future, which we figured out together.

Our futures weren’t headed the same direction. It was a theme for me in those days.

Single Life In NW Portland

I got off the bus with everything I owned, which wasn’t much. After three months of relationship study in Southeast, I rented an apartment on the other side of town.

It reminded me of Greenwich Village the first time I walked around.

Then I walked around some more before I got a bike and rode around. Portland was a growing bike city in the early 80’s and a 26″ Fuji fit right in.

I experimented on the bike by learning how to ride in the city without getting run over. I learned not to ride with a bike lock cable around my neck, and not to set speed records with reflectors in the wheel spokes.

At high speed the reflectors catch air and make the bike shimmy; the cable could get hung up and yank me off the bike. Most people know these things.

My big question about the bike was one of distance. How far was too far?

One Saturday my mom’s new husband, an owner/operator trucker, was coming through town. In those days she liked to take trips with him.

He was running with an empty trailer so I asked if he could strap my bike down and I’d ride with them down to Eugene and bike back up the next day.

We had a nice time together before the big bike ride.

Sunday Morning Bike Ride On The Road

I got up, gathered myself, made a few sandwiches, and rode out of Eugene. My plan was rolling up the backroads, which changed when the backroads had too many rolling hills.

By the time I got to Brownsville I changed plans and headed back to I-5 and the flat track. Pro tip: It only looks flat.

That’s when I realized how important padded bike shorts were. Since I couldn’t stand on the pedals for a hundred miles, I pedaled from the seat. As the pain in my grundle increased I pedaled harder to lighten the contact on the seat, which was exhausting.

I put my head down and pedaled like never before with cars and trucks whipping by on the left side. My focus was good until I saw a snake in front of me. The damn thing looked like it took up the whole shoulder.

If I dodged it to the left I’d be closer to traffic and the wind; if I dodged to the right I might crash. So I cruised by hoping the fucker wouldn’t channel its inner-rattler and decide to strike.

I got off the bike and walked it a few times to rest. That seat was a problem. I realized that if I kept stopping I’d never make it to Portland before dark, so I pushed on. During one rest walk I ate a sandwich. I had an upset stomach the rest of the day.

By Salem I was gassed and ready to call for help, but who? And where was a phone? So I kept going.

I pulled in at the rest stop past Woodburn and laid down. All I wanted to do was Go. To. Sleep. Just before that happened I saddled up to finish this epic bike ride in style, and no calls for help.

The Last Leg On My Last Legs

By now the bike seat felt like a small shoes for big feet on a long walk. It was doing damage. I started wondering if professional bike riders ever had kids after spending so much time on a bike seat.

The pain went away, replaced by numbness. I couldn’t feel anything seat related. It lasted three months.

I rode into Portland, pedaled over to my place in Northwest, and pledged to never do it again. I met my neighbor from across the hall, a bike riding woman who I’d met soon after moving in.

She was going to be impressed by my ride, which was one of the goals. But it turned out she was a member of a bike club. They did official ‘Century Rides’ and longer in smaller groups.

She told me my mistakes from shorts, to liquids, to shoes, to riding alone on the freeway. Smart girl. I like smart girls, but she had reservations about knuckleheads who put themselves at risk.

I wanted to ask her about the troubling numbness I felt in my nether region, but had second thoughts. Besides, how do you even start that conversation?

The good news was I checked the box for Century Ride, which was on the same page with the box for Run A Marathon in 3:32. (The bike ride clocked in at over nine hours.)

Not long after, I met the love of my life and the first thing we did was get her a bike, a lovely Univega.

I rode my bike into the ground; her’s looks fresh off the showroom floor. We didn’t ride much together, but found other things to do, like get married, have kids, and move to the suburbs.

Needless to say, the numbness from so long on the seat didn’t do permanent damage, so I had the going for me.

The lesson learned: Find a challenge, get prepped, and go get it. Making the effort is an accomplishment. That’s all the matters, the biggest goal to achieve, after all we’re not the complacent types on this blog, right Laurien?