After nursing multiple injuries (foot/back/knee), I finally got my body sorted out and finished off my first 30-mile week of lumbering since mid-March, getting in 30.10 miles in 5 days, and it felt damn good!
Wifey was out of town this past weekend celebrating her dad’s 75th birthday, and I was left home to do what I do all weekend, which was to include lots of football, beer, and enjoying the first REAL spring weather of the year for TWO DAYS IN A ROW!!
Things started great, with a giant breakfast burrito made up of semi-homemade turkey sausage using 93% lean turkey, diced potatoes, egg whites, cheese, and hot sauce while gulping coffee and watching Spurs play Newcastle.
Sadly, Spurs played like shit, and by halftime, I was done with them, looking for something to do outside, and decided on a photo creep around Meridian Park to stalk birds, eagles, and critters.
The last time I did a photo creep, I stepped in dog shit and got very few keepers, so I figured it could only get better.
And it did. From a distance, I could see Sam the Eagle perched near his nest and later would manage to get a glimpse of him soaring high in the blue spring sky. The photos sucked, but it’s always nice to see an eagle.
I putzed around, got some shots I liked, and then headed home to cut the grass for the first time this year before making lunch, and alternating between sitting my ass in a deck chair in the sun and sitting my ass in a comfy chair with a beer watching the footy.
***
***
One of my favorite meals of 2024. So good!
Sunday, it was Liverpool’s chance to play like shit, and I had enough. So, I gathered my gear and took the Stache out for a short 11-mile out-and-back gravel ride from the Cul De Sac Shack. It was my first time riding outside in 926 days, and it felt amazing for multiple reasons.
I was so nervous before I left that I thought I was having a mini-panic attack and had to intervene with my brain and point out that I have done this literally THOUSANDS of times in my life, and I got this. I also seemed to have lost my seat bag over the past 30+ months, so I used a CamelBak Chase pack to carry my essentials. A pack that I promptly left sitting on the garage step and had to turn back for after half a mile.
I was shocked at how good my legs felt but was content to do a short out-and-back ride just to see how I felt, mentally more than physically. Also, without Wifey to pick my ass up if I had a catastrophic bike or body failure, I thought it best to stay real close. I guess I could have called an Uber if anything happened; “I’ll be at the intersection of two corn fields, covered in dust in sweat. Oh yeah, and I have a broken bike with me.”
I was happy to have finally put some demons to bed, demons that, if I’m honest, I don’t exactly know the cause of. I look forward to getting out again in the coming days, but if I don’t, it’s cool— I know it’s there. I also know that while I haven’t been riding my bike, all the lumbering has kept me in good enough shape that a quick 11-mile ride on dirt roads was just a pleasant Sunday spin.
My version of Salsa’s Chase the Chaise.
In the past month, I have got back in the saddle for indoor riding, successfully rested and recovered from multiple injuries without falling [back] into the pit of despair, got back to lumbering 30-mile weeks, photographed sports for the first time since 2022, and was back on the bike outdoors for the first time since October of 2021. Additionally, this coming week, barring another goofball injury, I will surpass 2,000 miles hiked since September 19th, 2022.
What could happen?
I am admittedly feeling pretty darn OK about getting my mental shit together after a few years of wallowing in depression, but it wouldn’t have been possible without the support of Wifey, B, the O.G. Mindbender, and 10mg of Lexapro taken once daily with breakfast; preferable a giant homemade breakfast burrito.
Later.