Dodging tree limbs, Hurricane aftermath

I sat it out for two days, though the worst of the storm and an extra day to allow for clean up and dodge the rain. From north of DC, I only have roughly 300 miles to New York, so I had some time to play with. I read a book. I napped. I shouted at the news with my uncle.

I left Wednesday. All I needed to ride was some 50 miles and change a day and I’d be back in NYC by Monday. I left a bit later in the day, figuring it would be worth it to dodge some of the DC traffic. Besides, I figured the first miles would be quick: It was all bike path until I got well north of the city.

Within half a mile of the bike trail, I realized riding was going to be slower than I thought: A tree three feet in diameter lay across the path. With some adult dressed in a lion costume and–disturbingly–walking alone watching, I lifted my bike over and picked my way through the branches. The next 15 miles were like a cyclocross race: deep mud, washed out paths, jogging through thorn bushes to get around fallen trees. I got to the end of the bike path muddy, wet and scratched up, but happy to be done with that section.

It was at this moment that I realized I’d dropped my map, “Fuck!” I shouted.

The guy blowing leaves shout me a wounded look.

“No, sorry, not you.”

He glared.

I went back up the trail in search of the map–I’d be out of luck for the next four days if I didn’t find it.

After two miles of riding, looking, asking people on the path if they’d seen it and enduring their advice on how I should find it, I got lucky enough to find it. By the time I got back to where I was it was 12:30 and I’d only ridden 20 miles.

I was still in the DC area, and the route took me sharply east into the exurbs of Baltimore. Those roads were busy, and people were driving like assholes. For the third time this trip, I was run off a two-lane road by an oncoming car passing traffic in my lane. By now I’ve had the practice, and was able to get off the road with more than enough time to proudly brandish my middle finger.

The rest of the ride was uneventful, though I did realize oncee serious problem with riding in one of the most populous regions of the U.S. For two months now I’ve been peeing with gleeful abandon, hell, on roads so quiet that I wouldn’t even pull of the road before letting lose. It’s been a glorious few weeks of shitting in the woods and answering even nature’s quietest whisper.

This is no longer possible, and the more people there are the less inclined I am to leave my bicycle outside while I run into to relieve myself. Twice on this ride I found myself making desperation pees on the sides of busy roads, hoping I wasn’t giving too many people a free show.

Although, to be fair, camping sites are also becoming scarcer and being arrested for public indecency might be a nice way to get a cheap place to stay for the night.

Staying ahead of the hurricane, riding onto military bases.

After eating near constantly the night before, having a few beers, and flirting mildly with a few girls (as I mentioned, by cousins were there), I woke feeling recharged.

Well, I felt like a cellphone after an hour on the wall: Not quite 100% but enough charge to get what I needed, which is to say, four instagram photos of my breakfast and a status update saying something snarky about the election.

Hurricane Sandy was becoming enough of a threat that I wanted to be inside for her, and I figured hunkering down in DC with my Aunt would be far preferable to lounging in some seedy motel for two days. I had two days to get there, but wanted to leave Sunday’s ride as short as possible as the storm was predicted to start making it’s entrance sometime Sunday afternoon.

I left a bit late, riding on mostly quiet roads. I felt good. I called my cousin’s fiancé and asked me to send me directions to Dumfries, about ten miles north of where I was planning on going.

The quiet roads abruptly ended and threw me into the roiling strip mall traffic surrounding Fredericksburg. It nasty riding, and I pulled off: My cellphone was dying and I needed a loop around this shit ride. This many miles in traffic and I figured I’d used up my nine lives. Most of them in LA.

Re-routing took forever and my phone died. I was losing time. I charged it outside a gas station, and then got on my loop.

As I cruised down one hill a car pulled up next to me, a fat woman with red hair sat in the passenger seat:

“Excuse me, you dropped a jacket back there.”

“Oh! Thank you!” I turned around. It wasn’t a jacket, it was my only other pair of bicycle shorts, drying after I washed them the night before.

“Just back up at that stop light.”

I turned around and rode quickly back up the hill, past the woman who’d given me a dirty look the time before. At the first stoplight, I looked around. No sight of my short. I rode up to the second light: No sign.

I was pissed. I was already frustrated with having to ride through all this traffic and now I was wasting more time, and my shorts might be gone. It sounds mild, but little things like that can be near devastating in the middle of a ride.

I started to backtrack up to the next stoplight, when the same car drove by, my shorts being brandished out the passenger side window. I laughed aloud. All across this country, people have lamented the end of society, how dangerous the world has become, but to them I say: There are still people in this world. Good people, honorable people, who will see a smelly man drop his tight-fitting shorts on the road, drive around the block, and pick them up off the street to give back to you. Without this, terrorists would win.

With my phone charged, I checked back in on my directions, and noticed something odd: A greyed-out area on the map. It was quantico military base, and my directions thought it would be a really good idea for me to cut straight across it.

This had happened before, when I wandered fuirther than I should have onto a military base in the Mojave desert, before being repelled by an agitated Military Policeman with braces.

I decided to skip this adventure, but this meant I wasn’t making it to Dumfries. WIth all the re-routing and chasing down escape-minded bicycle shorts I’d be lucky to make it to Stafford before nightfall.

I wasn’t lucky. With an overcast sky, night came dark and quick. After the attempt at the military base practical joke, my map tried again, this time sending me through a prison. The map was more successful in tricking me this time, and I didn’t figure it out until a scandalized security guard shooed me away like I was the biggest idiot he’d seen in awhile, which is a very low opinion to have of someone when you work at a prison.

I got in at dark, and after spending half an hour listening to the talkative motel attendant tell me all about her life as a med school student and her boyfriend, I happily crashed into bed, rising only to let a pizza in the door.

Falling apart on the Blue Ridge Parkway

I’ve been so exhausted that I’ve drooled on myself, pissed on my shoes, dozed off on the bicycle, napped heavily in the shade of a desert outhouse. I’ve mumbled at road signs, talked to myself, cursed my stove out.

I’ve never been so exhausted that I bonked getting out of my sleeping bag, not until Friday. The day before had ended with a cruel three-mile climb up to Virginia’s Blue Ridge Parkway. It was getting dark and I was still way too far from where I wanted to land that night. Instead I rolled into a resort, paid way too much for a campsite, and slept on their stage–another step forward in my planned career re-invention in NYC as a bicycle-themed performance artist.

I was so exhausted that I didn’t bother to cook: I ate a pack of graham crackers, peanut butter, crawled into my sleeping bag and fell heavily asleep. I woke, twice, to my stomach rumbling, but the air was cold and I stayed in my bag, ignored my stomach’s pleading and went back to sleep.

This was a mistake. I awoke starving, a bit wobbly. I ate all the oatmeal I could, drank a full bottle of water, and got on the bike. It was going to be a short day: My cousins were in Charlottesville for a wedding, and their offer of the spare bed in their hotel room was too tempting.

The short day turned out to be a necessity, not a luxury.

My legs started burning immediately, aching. It felt like I’d been riding for 70 miles. The road didn’t help me. The ride was covered in deep fog, and as it went steadily, slowly up, the fog got deeper, visibility dropping from 100 to 50 to 20 feet.

A long hill is a mental game, and I lacked the patience I needed to sit back and just pedal. I ached. “Go the fuck down!” I finally shouted in frustration.

The hill eventually obliged, and I coasted heavily, wobbling along at only a few miles an hour, glad only that I didn’t have to pedal. The fog deepened, and I got little notice that after only a few hundred feet I was going back up again. I cursed again, but tried to accept it. My eyes felt heavy. I wished I’d slept longer.

Eventually I turned off of the ridge, a coiled hill of switchbacks kept me from letting go of my brakes. That was fine, the downhill could have lasted the rest of the day for all I cared.

It didn’t, but it remained flat, mercifully. I’d only gone 15 miles, and I’d been on the road close to two hours. The other great mercy was an apple orchard that was selling cider donuts. Still warm, I ate 12 in the presence of 2 screaming classrooms of pre-school children.

One child came up to me, followed by his beaming mother, proud that the child could talk.

“Those donuts are delicious!”

I eyed him warily, trying to think of what I was going to say if he asked for one.

“They are.”

“They’re sooo good.”

Child, I’m not falling for your hints. My donuts.

“They are. What did you like best about them?” His mom was so proud, and the kid was admittedly cute.

“The sugar!”

“That IS good.”

“I ate like four.”

I became less concerned that the creature was trying to steal my donuts. We went on in this vein for awhile, with the child telling a rambling anecdote that centered around the already established fact that he’d eaten four donuts with lots of sugar and enjoyed them immensely.

The mom, too, got bored, and called him along. I was left to my donuts.

Another mom came up, younger, with a voice that had a heaviness to it, like she was talking from deep inside a clothes closet.

“Look like you’re on a long trip.”

“LA to NY,” I said, smiling. She wasn’t going to steal my donuts.

“Wow! That’s amazing! That’s really cool!” She had the enthusiasm of someone who spends part of her day being amazed at poorly conceptualized finger paintings.

“Thanks.”

“Well, good luck. Be safe.”

“‘Ppreciate it.”

Later she came up to me again as I sat, avoiding looking at my bicycle and the miles still left in it for the day.

“Do you need anything?”

“No, I’m great, thank you,” I said, wiping donut sugar from my mouth. There was a lot of sugar on it.

Feeling bolstered by her kindness, and more to the point, driven out by the shrieks of children, I got back on the bike.

I chose a busier road over the roundabout backroads route and cut my ride even shorter, wobbling in, happy to see cousins, family, people I didn’t have to explain my trip to and from whom I could accept a meal. And a beer. And a warm bed. And cider donuts if they had any.

What not to say to cyclists.

Listen. I know I look weird, and I know my bike looks like a big-hipped alien, and the two of us together makes us really noticeable and interesting, and I know that means that I’m going to get unwanted attention, but there are rules.

To be honest, I need a rest day. I haven’t had one since St. Louis, and I’ve put some serious hills behind me, but DC is in theory within reach in three days, and there’s word of a huge storm that could put me out of riding for a few days. I need to make that my rest day or I won’t be back by the fifth. And I want to be back by the fifth.

The thing about not having a rest day is it probably makes me a little bit crankier, or at least in a more delicate mood, so when you walk into a café, and you see me engaged in conversation with someone, don’t come up, stand between the two of us and interrupt, “Asking, where are you coming from?”

This is in it of itself a fine question, though a reeptitive one, and I don’t mind answering. I DO get annoyed when you interrupt to ask it, and when you so clearly just asked so you could talk about yourself that you don’t even wait for me to answer to tell me about how you bicycled across country with your wife.

This is a fine fact, and one that could be nicely worked into a conversation between the two of us, appropriately begun when I finished my other conversation, but don’t just throw it out there. THat goes for the people who call me over to tell me long-winded stories about their own bicycling adventures, how their son-in-law likes bicycling, or the fact that you once slept outside or in a van when you were 25.

Again, fine information if you take the time to steer the conversation that way, but don’t assume I’m interested in your poorly remembered adventures.

Of greater importance is the questions you ask. Before you ask me something, think, “Is this something that he’s probably answered before?” Challenge yourself, be creative. Come up with something I’ve heard.

NEVER. And I mean NEVER ask:
How many flats I’ve had. If I’ve had any close calls/accidents. If I’ve had any mechanical issues.

No matter how I answer this immediately curses me in the eyes of the cycling gods. If you do ask, the touring cyclist will be compelled to enter into a horrible ritual that involves marking the forehead with bicycle grease, throwing gatorade powder over the shoulder, and drinking a concoction made from the sweat of wrung-out bicycling gloves. Do not jinx us. I don’t want to answer these questions.

Finally, unless there is a dire warning, don’t tell me that the next part is going to suck. This is a favorite thing. people love to deliver bad news, it feeds some dark feeling of power and superior knowledge. In California people warned me about the desert heat. In the desert about the mountains, in the mountains about how boring the flats were, and when all else fails, the weather.

I am inspired to say all this because of one such encounter with a man today, who had the silvery fox look of Virginia blue blood. You could just tell that at least one of his ancestors owned slaves or at least dabbled in indentured servitude.

After interrupting me, dominating a conversation, and telling me all about his trip with his wife, he then proceeded to warn me about an upcoming climb.

“It’ll be the worst on your whole trip.”

I’d been polite, but I allowed myself to be a bit snotty: “I sincerely doubt that.”

“Trust me.”

“I road through Colorado.”

“So did we. It’s five miles long, really steep.”

“Thanks.”

I suppose I should thank him. While the hill was three miles long instead of five miles, it was vindictively steep, twisting, and banked. But I was so focused on hating this guy that I spent the entire time convincing myself that the hill wasn’t that bad, and certainly wasn’t the worst climb I’d experienced. It was certainly in the top ten, and by the time I got to the part, I was blown apart, but not the worst, the jerk.

It did mean that I had to cut my day short, and instead of camping out in Greenwood, Virginia, I’m sleeping on a holiday resort’s stage on the Blue Ridge, hoping the higher elevation doesn’t mean it’ll get too freezing.

Nobody warned me about the weather tonight.

The sheriff doesn’t answer.

I ate my three breakfast donuts, munched on what other things I had, and headed out. I needed to hit Radford Virginia and get to me to a bike shop, not for repairs, but to see if they had an elusive Virginia bicycling map. I was going based off of photos of a map, which was a less than ideal situation.

FIrst bike shop was closed, and I consoled myself with a “buy five get one free” deal at the local cookie shop. On the way out of town, saw a little shop and rolled in.

I asked the counter guy for the map in question and he said he’d never heard of it. We pulled it up online, and the PDF was so big it froze out his computer. I thanked him, and was about to get back on the road, but he took me next door to a print shop. The file was so big that to get it to print right took a number of steps. I was stuck: They were helping me out, so I couldn’t impatiently bail on them, as much as I wanted to be back on the road. They were nice guys, anyway, so I didn’t mind sitting through the fussing.

By the time I was back on the road it was past one, and I’d only ridden 30 or so miles. With the days so short, this could really screw me over. I rode quick, though I tried to pass myself over the rolling hills, which had cruelly taken their sneaky toll last week.

I paused to check my new map, already folded wrong and stained with sweat, and heard an “on your left” shout from behind.

Two women rolled past. An older woman, and a tanned and toned younger woman. I wasn’t sure if she was attractive, but after my experience with the naked Airstream trailer lady, she was close enough. I pedaled after them, caught them quickly, found them to be rather boring conversationalist, and rolled on. I’ll admit it feels good to be passing people easily with this much gear on my bike. Given that a touring cyclist’s days are filled with smelly encounters, peeing on the side of busy roads, and dribbling gatorade as you gasp up a hill, the odd ego boost is a nice touch.

I planned to camp in the Town of Troutville, but when I stopped to call over to the town office (my picture of a map informed be that one had to do so), I discovered I didn’t have service.

I kept riding, but by the time I got service, the offices were closed. I called the sheriff’s office, which, while I suppose I should have been worried instead of amused, just rang and rang and rang.

I camped out anyway, and did my best to present myself as a friendly harmless individual as I set up camp in the midst of children in the playground.

I slept heavily, despite the freight trains rolling by so close that the ground vibrated, and was up feeling more rested than I had in days.

Last of the mountains: 75 miles to Fort Chiswell, Virginia

Perhaps driven out by the smell of the Appalachian Trail hikers, I was out of my sleeping bag around 7:30, but due to some dawdling, the chance to have a strong cup of coffee and purchase a replacement spork for the one I’d tragically broken, it wasn’t until after nine that I was officially on the road, ready to ride.

Looking at the elevation map, I had two big climbs, and then a series of small rollers in a long, steady downhill. I would be done with the Appalachians, done with the mountains, and soon to hook left and head north. I still have hundreds of miles to go, but thats an order of ten smaller than thousands of miles to go.

The first climb was long, steady, picking its way through a shaded valley with a shallow river. I passed a sign that said “Department of Corrections Roadwork Ahead.” I’d never seen a chain gang, and was a bit excited to see this throwback. Sadly, or happily for them, they weren’t chained, they wielded weed whackers instead of pick axes (I assume to teach them that “weed is whack), and there was no drawling foreman with a gun. I waved to them, they waved back, and I rolled on, somewhat disappointed.

I peaked, and found myself on a slight downhill, cruising along. The day was warm, stupid warm for this late in October, but I couldn’t complain. Climate change has its benefits, if I may be so selfish. With a slight sense of shame, I’ll admit that I even banked on these few weeks of Indian summer when I left so late.

I kept waiting for the second climb to start. I was going up slightly, but not nearly enough to count it as a climb. I waited, double-checked my map to make sure I wasn’t off route, and suddenly, found myself back on a downhill. I was up and over, and hadn’t even realized it. Pleased with myself, I pushed into the downhill, cruising along. Today was supposed to be my rest day, but I was now debating about pushing on another twenty or so miles to 95.

As I got closer to my destination, I decided not to. A rest day is a rest day, and I didn’t want to push dusk on roads I didn’t know. Besides, a lot can happen in two miles–a nice downhill can turn on you, become a mean uphill–let alone twenty. I played it safe.

I grabbed a motel room, and then headed to the convenience store up the road, buying two foot-long subs, three protein shakes, and, in the surest sign yet that I”m back on the east coast, a half dozen of crispy cream donuts. The six-foot-five, three-hundred-pound cashier I’d me skeptically:

“You gon’ eat all that?”

“Yep.”

“You sure?”

“Yep.”

“Damn, dude, y’all musta bicycled type far to eat all that.”

Amen. Back at the motel, I saved three of the donuts for breakfast, watched some of the Cosby Show, my favorite motel activity, and went heavily to sleep.

The naked lady airstream trailer story

M– and I woke around 7. He had a tight deadline to be done within a week, so his plan was to get up and out early and put in some serious mileage. I figured I’d join him for awhile, and was focused on not holding him back.

We’d both been traveling from the west coast (he started in Seattle) by ourselves for weeks, and I think were both sensitive to the fact that we had our own set and delicate routines, and both of us were careful not to upset the other’s routine.

He wanted to be on the road by 7:30, but between talking to our host and alternately fussing with our gear, we weren’t on the road until 9:30. I overemphasized to M– that he shouldn’t slow down for me. He was carrying likely 20 pounds less gear than I, which meant the second the road went uphill, I was operating at a serious handicap.

With someone to talk to, the miles passed quickly. On the first hill, I kept pace with M–. On the second, he left me on the last stretch. I pushed to catch up with him on the downhill, but the Appalachian mountain roads are wickedly steeped and devlishly curved.

I’d talked to a gas station attendant as I came into the mountains, and he asked why everyone riding east to west always rolled into his town all beat to hell. I guessed it was the hills, and my experience was right. Coming down on a loaded bike was a challenge.

I pushed to catch up with M–, but around one hairpin, I found myself heading over the yellow line into the opposing lane, there was no traffic, but I decided as much as I wanted a conversation, it wasn’t worth flying off one of these roads or getting intimate with someone’s bumper.

At the bottom, M– was pedalling slowly. I urged him for the umpteenth time not to let me hold him back. I felt like the injured soldier in some cheap war movie in which all the soldiers inexplicably wear flourescent spandex–“go on without me” I begged, “I’ll be alright.”

He rode with me awhile longer, but then the third climb hit–two miles up at 8-to-10 percent grade. Slowly he pulled away, until I finally lost him around a curve. It was a very zen way for our ride time together to end, almost as fluky as how we’d ended up riding together. That was my only thought, so little oxygen was going to my head.

The hill down that road was narrow, one and a half lanes at best, and so precariously placed it was like the asphalt itself was barely hanging on to the cliff face. I wasn’t catching him again and kept it slow.

I crossed the Virginia border, and though it was late in the day, and the climbs had left me somewhat draggy, I wanted to make up for the blown day yesterday and kept going. In Haysi, Virginia, just over the border, was the “Hill Top Inn.”

From the campsite I skipped on, three nasty climbs rose upp to whip whatever energy I had left. I road into Haysi exhausted, and stopped in at the convenience store to grab some food and get a recommendation for any other motels in town.

“Is there a motel other than the HIlltop in town?”

“Bless your heart. That’s it, though I wouldn’t stay there.”

“Why not?”

“It’s just…”

“Out of a horror movie?”

“Yeah–you should stay in the state park.”

“Oh, I just came from that way” I figured the teenage girl behind the counter was just exaggerating about the state of the motel. “How do I get to the Hilltop?”

“It’s far–15 minutes up the mountain…by car.”

The Hilltop Inn, was not, as my map promised, on route, nor was it, as the map described “on the big hill just outside of town.” It was three miles up the mountain. Not the hill. The mountain.

Finally it appeared, a squat, low building that was also a VFW post. The parking lot was near full. This was clearly the sort of motel that people lived in, or were placed in by their halfway program.

I walked over to the office and knocked on the door. A skinny veteran with no teeth and a staggering lurch kept starting to catch my attention and then nervously looking away when I made eye contact. Finally he worked up the courage, talking in a fast mumble:

“Idon’tthinkshe’sthererightnow,notthererightnow,justgointothebar,andsomeonecanhelpyouuntilshegetsbackbecauseshe’snotthererightnow,shejustleft.”

I thanked him, and steeling myself to at best get laughed at, at worst get kicked out, I walked in.

Through the smoke, several two tables of aging veterans and their wives looked up at me, guessing by my uniform that I probably wasn’t a soldier.

“You lookin’ for a room?”

“Yeah.

“She’ll be back in about 15 minutes,” said one guy with a scraggly beard, “where you coming from?”

“Well, I started over in Kentucky today, but I’m coming from LA overall.”

“LA? Holy hell. Judy? JUDY! Get this man a beer.”

“An old woman with short hair and one good eye got up, cigarrette dangling from her mouth and shuffled over to the bar.

I went to meet her, not wanting her to have to walk all over.

Cold beer in hand, I thanked the man, and sat down.

Two women came in, both in their fifties, one wearing no make-up, the other wearing enough for the two of them. They were followed by a burly man with a long pointed chin beard.

After making the rounds, the no-make-uped one noticed me sitting and came over.

“I’m Wrenda. Who are you?”

“I’m Adam–just biking through. Going to stay the night.”

“Ah, I passed you up the hill. Was wondering who that cute boy was.”

I laughed, changing the subject, “what do you do?”

“Do?””

“Yeah”

“Honey, no one around here has jobs.”

“Ah.”

“I used to work as as a water safety analsy at nuclear sites” this story led to a long rant that swung through nuclear sites, the FBI, and her fight with her brother over the family farm. I smiled, laughed.

“So you staying here tonight?”

“That’s the plan.”

“YOu shouldn’t stay here. Come stay with me, I’m a good judge of character. You seem sweet.”

I hestitated, but then the make-up lady, Nancy, came over and introduced me to her husband.

“Oh, you should! Y’all can come over to my house for dinner.”

The woman seemed nice enough, and the nice thing about being male, is that I feel safe enough to accept invitations from strange women without much fear.

“You can put your bike in my truck.”

At this point, Judy–JUDY!–came over, letting me know that I could go over to get my room now.

“C’mon,” said Wrenda, “save yourself some money. Stay with me.”

“Alright–thanks. That’s real nice of you.

We rode a few miles down the road, then turned down a dirt road to her home–an older airstream trailer in the middle of a field. It was awesome, and I’d never seen the inside of one of them. I changed quickly, and we headed over to Nancy and Louie’s.

Nancy was outside, a joint in her mouth, trying to get the fire started. Louie came out and gave me a tour of his vintage car collection. He started working in Detroit at 14, and got through eleventh grade before leaving to work fulltime at Chrysler, where he worked for 34 years. He was fascinating to listen to, had interesting and thoughtful politics, and a couple good stories, including the time he spent two weeks in a southern jail when he was 16.

When we came back out, Nancy had the fire going and was working on a fresh joint. “Y’all sit down–you can sit next to Wrenda, Adam. She’ll take good care of you.”

“Nancy!” Wrenda said, scandalized. I smiled uncomfortably.

The jokes didn’t stop there, nor did the joints, which I declined. Wrenda was getting friendlier and less scandalized with each reference to the fact that I was sleeping at her place that night, and I figured it would help to keep my wits about me.

I had a few beers, and relaxed about drinking: Wrenda had the peculiar quality of getting less attractive the less sober I got, which sounds nasty of me, but it is really a good thing. Think about it, if someone was still drunk enough at the end of the night to put in the effort to go to bed with her, it certainly cut down on the awkward morning and meant that waking up next to her was a good, not unpleasant, surprise.

I drank my third slowly. If I needed to get back on the bike that night, I wanted to do it sober.

After eating, with Nancy and Louie insisting I eat more than my share, it was time to head back to the trailer. It was past midnight, and Nancy was getting drowsy from all the joints.

When we were back, Wrenda fixed herself a margarita.

“I’m a good bartender. Want one?”

“Sure,” I said. It was not good. It was premixed, so her bartending skills apparently were graded only on her ability to place liquid in a glass.

“You’re so pretty.”

“Ha, thanks.”

‘”You are, I bet you take advantage of women with it.”

“No, Thanks, but you’re overeestimating my powers.”

“No, I’m not, I bet you know how to play it.”

“SO when do you think your going to sue your brother for the farm?”

It went on like this, with me playing oblivious and changing the subject to the few things I knew about her. Finally we went to bed. Separately.

She disappeared into the end of the trailer, and I lay down on the couch.

“Adam?”

“Mm?”

“You do take advantage of girls, don’t you.”

“Ha, not usually.” This conversation was tedious. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

Just as I was getting into a deep sleep, I heard her again, this time close buy, she was fixing the heat.

“You asleep?”

“Mmm? No.”

“Is it too warm?”

“No, it’s fine.” Something was odd about her silhouette in the dark, and I just turned my head and went back to sleep.

I woke around dawn, and started getting my stuff together, getting back on the road.

“You still here?”

I paused, debating about being able to sneak out.

“Hello?”

“Yep, just packing up, sorry to wake you.”

“It’s fine.”

Just as I was leaving, I went back to thank her, she was lying in bed, covered in her sheets, but clearly nude.

“Hey, Wrenda, I really appreciate the place to crash.”

“Sure.”

“I’ll send you a thank you post card when I get to New York, let you know how the trip’s going.”

“Sure.”
Gone was the friendly woman who’d invited me along.

I rode up to the main ridge road, mist still draining, it finally clicked in my head: If she was naked in bed, that meant she’d gone to bed naked. That’s what was off about her silhouette. She’d been standing buck naked a few feet from my the sofa, trying her best to raise my interest.

I shuddered, and not from the cold.

Stephen Foster state park and the man with too many toys

Trucks pulling into the store woke me: It was late, the time change also meant that it was dark until 7:30 or so, a change I didn’t account for.

I packed up quick, and then sat inside with a cup of coffee, as four or five older men, each more stereotypically country than the last, chatted about what they needed to get done in their yards, who was fixing their car. One man in his eighties was carrying an old spark plug that he was showing around. The burbling Kentucky accent made it hard for me to folllow what was so funny about the spark plug or the rest of the conversation, and after talking a minute with them, I got on my way.

I was tired. The rolling hills continued and as I come up on the 3,000-mile mark my body is aching. My legs have been sore for weeks, sore enough that it hurts to flex them, lactic acid build up from yesterday kept them aching and dragged me down on these hills. My left knee was still a bit tender from however I injured it before St. >ouis. Other reptitive use injuries were starting to crop up: The middle and ring fingers on my right hand were stiff and sore from shifting so much on these rolling hills. I couldn’t find a comfortable a comfortable gear and I couldn’t find a rhythm.

It was an uneventful day, but one that left me longing to be out of this rolling territory. I find I have a three day attention span with a given countryside, getting sick of deserts, alpine forests, rolling hills.

I camped out for the night in Bardstown next to a guy who rolled up with a jeep with a kayak on top, and a trailer that held a big kawasaki scooter and a bicycle. A man with toys, traveling around with nothing better to do. I hoped I didn’t turn into that.

Now that I’m reaching the end of my trip, I’ve started to wonder what readjustment will be like. The rhythm of this life is simple, uncomplicated, which doesn’t mean it should be idealized. It’s just very straight forward, and every day brings new experiences new people, you don’t feel like you’re missing anything, don’t feel panicked by the possible loss of a moment.

My trip-long fight with the stove continued. A few days ago, I ran out of white gas, so I filled it with gasoline. When I rolled into Ferne Clyffe it was dark and I was so tired and hungry that I failed to check if it was on the on or off side of the bottle. The stove wouldn’t stop sputtering, so I kept pumping it up, cooked my dinner, put out the flame. As I was eating dinner, it smelled of gasoline, and I realized that I’d pumped it out that the pressure had forced the rest of my gas sputtering out into a puddle on the ground.

Needing more fuel in Bardstown, I rode into town, and went to add fuel to the bottle. The nozzle sputtered in the bottle, splashing me with gasoline. Cursing, I went to fill the bottle, going past the fill line. I reeked of gasoline. I went to put the rest in the reserve bottle, and as I pulled it out of my bag, it sloshed: I still had white gas.

Back at the campsite, I had to track down the camp attendant and pour the extra guess into a bottle. Finally ready for dinner, I went to go light the stove, pumping it up. Gasoline came pouring out the side, again dripping all over me. After calling the stove owner, a man previously mentioned for his unfinished tattoo, I was missing an O-ring.

Put on the replacement, got it working, and went to bed full, but reeking of gasoline. The stove is idiot-proof, I’m just operating in a zone beyond.

METH IS GREAT YOU SHOULD TRY METH ON YOUR BICYCLE

Ok. Ok. OK. METH. You should try it, I mean, it’s fucking great. Like really good, like have sex on waffles in a massage chair covered in bubbles and thats amazing, but compared to meth it’s like pretty good.

I got up this morning and I was still pretty tired, like sleepy you know? Like I hadn’t had any sleep or like other shit that makes you tired and shit and I had coffee and while I had coffee I thought, they should make really strong coffee and then i thought, they do! It’s called espresso, and I thought that’s pretty good but sounds european as shit, and I drank my coffee and then I left and got back on the bike path and rode past the place where I almost camped and I was like, I should buy some meth. I should by some fucking meth. And why not? WHY THE FUCK NOT?

go to hell.

You go to the grocery store and get your eggs and your bacon and your toilet paper and shit, but you can’t buy fucking meth?! That’s messed up, but I bought some, and then I smoked some AND OHMYGODMETHMAKESYOUAWINNINGBEAST.

I was pounding on the pedals. I mean, i’m like Zeus kicking satan’s ass and i’m stomping on the pedal’s like they were Satan’s balls except the same size and I’m flying, and old people are getting TOOFUCKINGCLOSETOME so I stiff arm them into oblivion cause I’m a terror-blizzard raining hail on the damn flood plain and the levee has mother of god broken so here comes the thunder!

My right leg is Thor and my left leg is Zeus. Thunder and Lightning, motherfucker, mix your mythology like a meth cocktail. By the by, that would be divine

And there are squirrels on the trail, and I’m like those squirrels can go to hell, they make me so damn angry, I hate them, I hate the squirrels those sons of, of, of, OF OTHER SQUIRRELS. I despise them, and I think next one that comes along I’m going to kick it so hard it goes around the world and comes back to me and I’ll wear it like a hat like Davey Crockpot or Daniel Boone.

NO. FUCK HATS. THAT SQUIRREL IS GOING TO BE A MUSTACHE. A GREY AND WHITE STRIPED ROT-‘STACHE.

It’ll be fucking fashion. Like a hot 20-year-old girl with a Mitt Romney haircut with an Ed Hardy trampstamp but NOT ON HER BACK. ON HER FOREHEAD.

I rode so fast, I finished the last 60 miles on the Katy trail in like 45 minutes. I had like four ice creams. I love ice cream so much i hate it. I want to kill ice cream.

And there was a bridge and I went over it. A bridge is cool because it’s like a road but it goes over shit and then there was traffic because people live in cities, but I am the Hulk. I’ve got the anger, I’ve got the spandex shorts and I’ve got the green.

NOBODY dared get in my way they just beeped about how freaking beast I was and suddenly I was at the place I was staying, and I have to say I love meth, so much that even though I should save some for tomorrow, I smoked the rest.

AND I FEEL AMAZING. DID I MENTION IT WAS LIKE SEX? But better. Like, sex with guns on the sun flying into a bigger sun and exploding and shit and I feel so good.

Goddamn peaceful.

“Meth town”–a family resort

When I last left you, dear readers, our hero (meaning me), was happily in bed in a hunting cabin, heater blowing fiercely against the icy night.

This situation lasted about five minutes.

With a pop the pilot light went out. I got up, check the heater, tried to re-ignite the light, then remembered the owner mentioning something about “not much propane.”

Damn it.

I turned everything off, and then just to be safe, put on my shorts and went outside to turn off the full tank. The owner was outside, and in his high-pitched Missouri drawl, said “Oh, I was worried that might happen.”

He apologized, and then launched into a ten-minute monologue about anything that came to mind, no matter that I was shivering visibly in the night. He ranged from where his dad was from to where his grandpa was raised to the peculiar spelling of his name, to how he was Christianm to the sorts of dinners he liked to cook, what he ate that night, and finally ended, with, “See, I’m not a redneck, I’m a country boy. Know how you can tell the difference?

“No”

He whipped around and lifted the hair off his neck, “See my neck? It’s as white as my bottom.”

Laughing, shivering, I said goodnight.

I woke at four in the morning, shivering. The cabin was at best in the 30s. It took me twenty minutes to will myself out of bed to unpack my sleeping bag, get into it, and then get back into bed. I was then most comfortable.

I woke early, and was eager to get on the road. I was going to hit the Kati Trail in Clinton, MO. 264 miles of traffic-free bliss, scenic views, and hot babes. Well maybe not babes, but MILFs, well maybe not MILFS but an overweight soccer mom trundling along on a Walmart bike and secretly hoping one of her kids would fall off the trail. Hot.

I stopped for a big breakfast in Clinton–I was low on fuel and had avoided using my stove for dinner, leaving me hungry and protein=starved.

I tried to stop in at the outdoor goods store, still desperately in need of some legitimate winter gear (I’ve been riding around in my jeans and whatever layers I could come up with), but it was Sunday in small town Missouri. No luck.

I gave up and got on the trail. IT was beautiful. Bridges, tunnels, peaceful, quiet.

On a slow uphill, a guy in a t-shirt with triathlon bars passed me. I could see by his uneven rhythm that he was really pushing it to pass me and clear distance as fast as he could.

“Bitch, please.” I thought to myself, (Or maybe outloud), I’ve been riding daily for over a month, and while my turbo engine wasn’t there, to paraphrase Jan Ulrich, my diesel was. I accelerated slightly, and within the course of a mile, caught him.

Despite being a triathlete, he was a nice guy and we chatted for a bit before he turned around to end his 30-mile ride befre the football game. I had another 60 to go.

Perhaps it was the scenery, or days on dayts of longrides, but somehow the day slipped away from me. It was getting dark, and I decided I wasn’t going to make it as far as Rocheport. I rode through Boonville, and then into Franklin.

In Franklin was a campsite, and I arrived just as it really started getting dark. THe office was closed for the night. I filled out m form and went to pay, and then on the door, I saw an annoyed sign from another cyclist “No bathrooms, need repair.”

I decided to check out the site before camping.

The campsite was surrounded by trailer homes. Dogs were barking. An unsupervised trash fire burned, illuminating a backyard full of junk and rusted engines. In the park where I was to camp, shadowy groups of teenagers flitted about. No one acknoledged me, but they were quiet.

The feel wasn’t right. I left, riding back two miles in the pitch black. I stopped at the grocery store, and asked where the closest, cheapest motel was. The heavyset woman with a smoker’s voice gave me the store phone book and helped me look up numbers.

I found a cheap room at the Day’s Inn.

“Those roads are real dark” she said. “Hang out for an hour and either I or one of the guys will give you a ride hom. You can put the bike in the truck.”

I at first declined, but as I walked to my bike, I thought not, “What would Jesus do?” but “what would my mom be really un happy I did.”

I went back in and accepted the ride.

We chatted while she waited to be left off. I told her about the park, and the spooky feel I had from it.

“You made the right choice,” she said, leaning in “Meth town. Big problem down there.”

I was relieved.

Got in at the Days Inn. A beautiful girl was sitting in the lobby. I resisted the urge to desperately try to strike up a conversation, and put all hotel-related thoughts out of my mind. It’s been awhile since I’ve even spoken to a woman not in the context of buying gatorade or sitting in a diner, let alone a pretty one, but that was no reason to lose my shit.

I went to bed, dreaming that in a slip of inattention, I’d forgotten my goal and taken a flight back home. Furious and crying, I realized what I’d done, skipping out and not meeting my goal.

This is the second time I had this dream. I used to dream about what was coming up next, now I only fear not finishing, it seems.