Maggie doesn’t move.
She sits in the yard, watching as we ride past, unphased by our presence. Even her pup, Dumber — my nickname for the second half of this dynamic duo — stands like a statue as we roll by.
It’s that kind of day, when dogs on front steps and under shade trees pay us no heed. Only two react with emotion — a wiry brown mutt turning manic circles at the end of a chain, and a snub-faced fellow with more anger than size, racing left and right, the shock collar serving as a rail he cannot jump.
All the while we enjoy the peace, telling Dave about last week’s hilly 70-miler and hearing about his trip to New York City.
We’ve needed this, all of us in one way or another. For Dave it’s the return to open spaces of the Midwest. For Liz it’s a break from a mountain of paperwork the local school system requires in order to transfer our homeschooled daughter into the ranks of organized acadamia. And, I just need to be back on the bike, four days off like an eternity. It isn’t the time I’ve lost, it’s the energy. For days I’ve felt as if someone stuck me with a knife, until all joy that once flowed through me had bled out. I moved about lifelessly, without will or desire. I cannot explain the mood, cannot defend it, no more than I can explain my left hand or defend the need to breath.
Moods and rain and work have kept me off the bike more than I expected this summer. I put in as many rides in the first half of the month as I normally do in the first week. I have fewer long rides in preparation for RAIN, the 160-mile Ride Across INdiana. And, it’s been a week since I’ve seen the firepink while on the mountain bike trail at Westwood Park.
It’s good to be back on the bike again, especially on a day when the dogs leave us alone. So that friends can catch up on each others’ lives And so the essence of summer that we pass through — the warmth, the breeze, the smells — can stitch up the hole within me. So that I feel like living again.
25.64 miles — Henry County
