Sickness. No, not the kind of "sickness" that ensues from one "busting" the latest triple ollie shifty front side nose-grab mule kick, but actual illness. Good old fashioned, debilitating, hyper contagious malady. Recently, I had my own bout with a particularly nasty strain of viral infection. Imagine if the flu and streptococcus had a child, and I was the babysitter. It wasn't pretty.I was bedridden for days. I missed multiple days of school and work. I was a leaky mass of self-pity and boredom. As I lay upon my altar of wadded Kleenex and empty Robitussin kegs, I longed for one of my roommates to "pull an Old Yeller" on me. It wasn't the assignments I would have to make up or the loss of hours at work that bothered me so much. Rather, it was my sedentary state that drove me to near dementia.
I am a very active person. Much of my activeness is derived from pedaling a bike. I spend a fair amount of time in the saddle; I commute by bike; I do long road rides; I climb short distances uphill. For me, riding a bike is an outlet. It gives me time to breath, sort things out, relax. My riding is as therapeutic as it is invigorating. When that outlet
is taken away, I become anxious, grouchy, even neurotic. So, when faced with this latest episode of infectious incapacity, I had to dig extra deep to self-preserve.
To help pass the time in bed, I borrowed a pile of old race movies from my local bike shop. This did little to ease my desire to ride. I found myself half heartedly mounting my Eddy Merckx while imagining going head to head with Erik Zabel in the finishing sprint of the Milan-San Remo. However, once the nausea and faint crept in I had to
secede and let "big E'' take it at the line. Phil Liggett was there, too, I think.
It's a funny thing to be passionate about something, especially pedaling a bicycle. The appeal of riding cannot be fully understood until you do it. Not only is it the kinesthetics involved; moving within the medium of mechanical advantage, but it's also the synergy with your machine. There's just something very satisfying about self-locomotion, whether it be shifting through a magazine of cogs, or simply rolling a huge gear around the track. I feel this connection every time I ride, with all my bikes. Some days, the bike feels like an extension of myself, responding almost involuntarily. Other days, we seem miles apart, in constant argument. Mostly, we tend to disagree on distance and gradient. Although, it's usually mewho's doing the complaining. The point is, I miss my bike.
As I near the end of my hill climb time trial to recovery, and my Z-Pac of steroids, those first
few days of fever induced hallucinations seem a distant memory. Following my disinclined return to school and work, the next step is to get back in the saddle. As I fantasize over the first commute to campus, I can only imagine the layers of anxiety it will unfold. Even that short distance will reawaken my legs, and whet my appetite for some real miles. I can't wait. Unfortunately, that is still a few days away. Until then, I am reduced to commuting by bus and envying my fellow Boulderites mounted atop two wheels. As they say in Green Bay, when speaking of Brett Favre, "enjoy it while you got it.'' Because, if it isn't the flu season or old man winter, those lovely Fall rides a finite experience.
Keep it greased!
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