Bicycle Eyes

My eyes track not the road, but a tree line to the east. Going out. Coming back. I affix my thoughts on that wall of sycamores and maples and poplars. I put myself there again.

Two days ago I stepped off a bridge above the Big Blue River, landing knee-deep in water that, despite the summer heat, required a bit of acclimation. It carried with it a slight chill from the previous night’s rain, which had been enough to send the river creeping over the lowest gravel bars.

Hope joined me, still relatively new to the adventure, yet I waded forward with thoughts of dozens of such treks when I was her age — walking up the Wabash River, the Rock Creek and feeder streams too small to have names worth remembering.

It took us awhile to move out of sight of the bridge. When we did, I felt as if I could breathe for the first time in weeks, that I could let work-related stress float past me like leaves on the current, and I could finally enjoy a day that carried more irritation than celebration.

On the Big Blue River.

We walked, saying little. Stopping at gravel bars, exploring ditches and checking out old dumps. It took roughly five hours to cover two miles. I would happily have stayed longer, walking farther upstream, remaining with the banks’embrace. But Hope tired, so we stepped out of the water, pushing aside head-high weeds to tunnel our way to the top of Mill Bridge and out of the day.

For the first time in ages, I felt like a kid again.

Riding today, the river is there, beyond a tree line to the east. I see it from the saddle, unable to turn away.

Road bike: 22.05 miles — Henry County

We ride down the middle of summer, on a stretch of chip-and-seal a lane and a half wide, with corn planted so close to the ditch I can almost touch it with an outstretched hand.

I’m far removed from where I grew up, but these are the roads of my childhood. I could never live anywhere else.

One morning earlier this week, on a trip to pick up my daughter from cross country practice, I discovered a pig in the middle of the road. It had escaped from a pen a rock’s throw away, and a stocky boy in jeans and a T-shirt was in pursuit. Parking in the ditch, I joined the chase, circling the pig back to the youth, who expressed genuine gratitude for my assistance.

That’s how I was raised, to help a neighbor. Where I live it’s still a practice as common as chicory on a July morning.

This isn’t the place portrayed in magazines that claim to showcase the country way of life. Their lavish photo spreads of pristine homes and invented room settings are more fiction than fact. I live in the real country, unconcerned about dandelions and buckhorn in my front yard, where on any given morning I’m likely to find the cat has puked on the hardwood floor and where no one panics if dishes occasionally go unwashed overnight.

The country portrayed by New York City publishing houses is far removed from a setting that would be recognized by Gladys Taber and Annie Dillard. The ideal of those rural writers still exists here, where cicadas offer circular-saw songs from the walnut and locust trees on an overgrown hillside just outside my office window, and where meals still come from the vegetable garden in the side yard.

Riding today in the country — the true country — we find no reason to hurry. Neither pace nor distance matter this afternoon. Instead, we enjoy the season and the surroundings. We wouldn’t have it any other way.

Road ride: 22.07 miles — Henry County

Her question is rhetorical.

“What’s the purpose?” Liz asks.

She speaks out of frustration, like a tightly covered pot brought to a boil, able to contain an ireful energy for only so long before the laws of physics take over. Then the words tumble over the edge and spill before me.

I know certain stresses have lit this fire, including the lack of any cycling-related goals this summer. So when I ask if she wants to go for a ride, she sees no reason to get anywhere near the bike.

But she does. Half an hour later she’s in the saddle, sharing a road with me. On the day the Tour de France goes up Alp d’Huez, I plot a course that takes in two of the best climbs within close proximity. Then we wend through the country, the scent of corn pollen thick in the air.

The ride is cathartic. Like dipping ourselves into some holy river, we emerge cleansed by waves of the day’s heat and humidity, purified by exertion over time and distance.

When we return home, we both understand the purpose, having enjoyed a summer afternoon like kids — on a dependable bike and with a best friend. No other reason is needed.

Road bike: 24.02 miles — Henry and Rush counties

This remains.

Settling into a more comfortable pace, I can see the woods again — an interdependent organism in a constant state of change. Deep under the cover of maples and hickories, the forest floor slowly chokes in colors of ailing yellow and burial brown. It’s here, in what little coolness that Westwood can offer on the hottest day of the year, I find some semblance of serenity. I could walk deep into that place and stay.

And this.

I come to Westwood with too much emotional weight pulled behind me, like a ball and chain around an ankle. I make it past the mile in good time, but the heat and humidity draw closer, and the drag increases. At two miles I glance at my watch and ease up. I’ve already lost too much time, and the oppressive weather isn’t helping.

And the three words I jotted down when I returned from my run.

No more excuses.

Everything else I delete. The decision to remove material from the first drafts of today’s blog entry is mine. I trim to create a better product.

In my 29 years as a journalist writing for more than 20 publications, only once did an employer refuse to run something I had submitted. It was an eye-opening experience about perceptions and standards from within my profession.

The specifics regarding the incident aren’t as important as the outcome. Although I disagreed with the logic behind the censorship, in the end I retained my integrity.

That day I learned some things.

A long time ago a great man taught me something. “Don’t make excuses,” he said, “make good.”

I could make excuses for slowing down today, but that’s not the person I am. I admit the weather — with a heat index of 105 degrees — was too much for me to be able to run what I had originally planned. I was realistic when I assessed the situation and honest when I made the decision to break off my initial pace. There was no shame in slowing.

My running, like my writing, is something I take great pride in. It goes back to integrity. I offer no excuses.

Trail run: 10 miles — Westwood Park

On this most perfect of summer days…

On a day I stood in absolute wonder as dozens of swallows circled over a creek…

On a day spent scrutinizing the colors of wildflowers playing a game of freeze tag alongside a woods…

Can there still be hope?

The question comes hours after the ride, darkness of night concealing everything outside the window above my desk. Searching for something different to listen to, I cue up Godspell, a musical I remember most from summers at church camp, back in a day when God still made sense. Tonight one track in particular, All Good Gifts, mines the deepest emotions.

We thank thee then, O Father, for all things bright and good,
The seedtime and the harvest, our life, our health, our food,
No gifts have we to offer for all thy love imparts
But that which thou desirest, our humble thankful hearts!

I used those lyrics in years past, when giving the blessing before Thanksgiving dinner. And, I sang them a thousand times, in good moods and during days of deep despair. Tonight it’s a bit of both.

This morning’s ride — on the rarest of perfect summer days — brings me to this place. With warm weather like an incubator, the afternoon came alive with the smell of ditches in a hundred shades of green, the cool touch of a forest, the tremendous view of rolling countryside seen from atop a ridgeline, and the scolding of a red-bellied woodpecker.

Despite all that, swallows are what my mind chased the most, what I want to never forget. Scores of the birds traced long, oval tracks in the air, alternating between flying, wings in motion, and gliding, a perfect aeronautic form. From the bridge deck, 15 feet above the water, I stood in greatest admiration as the birds moved around me. It was when they passed low toward the water that I got the unusual perspective of viewing the swallows from on high, as if perched atop one of the sycamores lining the bank. I didn’t want to leave.

I think of those swallows tonight. Of the wonder of a bird in flight. And my mind wings back to Godspell.

All good gifts around us
Are sent from Heaven above.
So thank the Lord, oh thank the Lord for all his love.

But it’s not that easy, those words. I felt something like love today, standing at the aluminum guardrail on that bridge, awed by creation. Felt it burrowing inside me like some living thing as I rode for hours on this perfect day. But by the time darkness covered my windows, I’m left wondering where God went with all that light and warmth.

There seems to be no one to ask. Not any more. People are too engaged in themselves to see others around them. It’s like the friend I visited in June last year, stopping by his house to talk. He had things to do that day, and we agreed to find an evening to go out for coffee. Months passed. I saw him at a Halloween party. He apologized for having not gotten together, saying he’d been busy. “That’s life,” I said. We agreed to try again to sit down some night. We never did.

I learned later that my friend, a deeply religious person, went to Japan after the March earthquake and tsunami to minister to the victims there. It struck me as odd that, in the name of God, he would travel 6,500 miles to the other side of the world, but he couldn’t drive 20 minutes across the county to see me.

I’ve given up on that part of religion in America — the church that claims to care but remains uninvested in the community outside its own four walls. Another friend of mine, a pastor, recently has come to the same conclusion, at least in part. We’ve been talking for a while about getting together some afternoon.

I really want to thank you Lord.

On this last day of the first half of the year, I want to feel something again. To find a reason to be thankful again. Not just when swallows swoop past me, but in the darkness of night, when I’ve got deadlines to meet and bills to pay, when the economy is in shambles and my main source of income seems to be hanging on a broken hinge.

I listen to Godspell, and remember a time when I had faith. Now the thought of a swallow’s flight has to be enough.

Road bike: 66.39 miles — Franklin and Fayette counties