Searching for Center

I rode around it, feeling instead my lips - so dry and heat-sucked that they would chafe off in a breeze - the trickle of sweat down my back into my shorts, the ache in my lungs and my quads. Up I kept going. Climbing High Grade and digging deep. For I still can and it is a beautiful thing to have that desire. The drive to keep pedaling, to use the cleats to pull up, to maximize my pedal stroke. Drive feels good. And the confidence that I could - keep pedaling,  and my steady cadence would take me the 50 miles and 5000 feet slated for the ride. My legs and lungs answered.

Inside, my mind imitated my pedaling feet, circling the issue, swirling around it. My mom. I have had low grade depression since visiting her. Her health is finally stable and she is home. But home like she used to be. Home and driven. While her health is stable, she is no longer strong and mobile enough to accomplish all of her aims by her own hand. When I pull in from Colorado, she sees two hands that can. It was a flurry of commands and pushes to weed the garden, put cages on tomatoes, drive to 6 stores, redirect vines, wash windows, fetch this or that from the basement or garden, cut asparagus. 

We kids used to joke that she was a slave driver - we were her slaves and she had us for the purpose of getting work done. It is a poor joke in terms of US history, but I felt where it came from on this visit. She was driven and drove me. She wants the life she used to have - dominion in her garden and kitchen. She was a dynamo in her day, raising and feeding eight kids, milking 72 cows twice daily, haying in the summers, chipping silos in the winter. She still has the drive but doesn't have the answering strength nor mobility. So she drove me. And it felt bad. There was no time to stop and gawk at the baby killdeers on the lawn; "No, I need you to get the fork for weeding for me before Dad comes." 

That is a piece of it too. Being caught in the middle of their war. When she pulled me away from working with him, he came to where we were weeding and said, "No, do not pull that weed. It's too dry. Let it go, TT. We are not going to do things the hard way. Wait for rain and then come out and pull these."

It wore me out, pulled me off-center. I felt like a failure of a daughter because I could never do enough. There was always more on the list. I was always wanting. And there was no meeting of minds, no questions about my life and interests, no joy. She has never been a confidante kind of mom, but we've had connection in the garden work or her health and my care of her. It wasn't there this time. There was just the demand to do more work. It makes me sad. I remember the kid I was and how I struggled with it. That kid came right back on this visit and was reeling. She's still here though I've been back in Colorado for a week.

I get the drive. I get the joy of the drive. I also get aging and loss. I am happy she is "raging against the dying of the light" (thank you, Dylan Thomas). As I want to PR every time I ride my bike, she wants the big beautiful garden she has always had, to cook three meals a day for her family, to make quilts that fetch $6,000 at the church auction. And she wants to do it all in a day.

I am still circling. I get pieces of it. I understand her desires. I understand my desire to please her. 

I also know that I can't. It's an impossible mission. And that's the rub. There is no steady cadence that will allow me to accomplish her aims. It's full throttle PRs every second. I can't do that. It is not possible. (Much less right. Even in a 9-day visit, I need some sense of self.)

Now it's accepting that and figuring out how to not feel like I've failed her. I need boundaries when I go there. I would ask her for a list, but she's never been a list person. She's more of a torrent of energy - what needs doing multiplies as we get into a job. I could do a dedicated number of hours per day, clock in and clock out. 

And meals... I have to set boundaries around those too. I developed an eating disorder as a teenager - out of that drivenness of the house and with the weirdness about food. She feeds us like crazy. The last three days of the trip I never felt hunger. The last morning I woke up to a breakfast of poached eggs on toast with hollandaise sauce and breakfast sausages. Plated. There were two kinds of baked desserts available at all times plus ice cream. And it gives offense to not eat the goods. That's the other piece. I don't do well with sugars. I've known that for years. She doesn't ever ask me though. Just gets sniffy if I don't eat the brownie. It's a power struggle.

Maybe underneath, that's the other piece. Power within our family. Her and dad competing, and whatever you can do to win...

Ugh! I just want my soul! To stick the knife into the brownies at 35 minutes and have it come out clean. Better, no brownies at all! Just my bike and a steep-ass hill, a steady cadence, sweat on my back and butt, heat-chapped lips... yes, that. Give me that!

I am still pedaling up this one.

When You're in Last Place

When you're in last place, so many thoughts go through your head...

Why did I ever sign up to train with Strong and Stronger? They're so much better than me!

They're talking. How can they be freaking talking??

They suggest that the must-haves for training rides are Kleenex and chapstick. When would I have time to apply lip balm? Use Kleenex? I would have to redirect energy from breathing in order to extract the Kleenex. Use breath to blow my nose? Never! 

Take in solid nutrition on the ride? See above.

Mantra: I will get stronger. 

Whimper: I will get stronger. Lookout Mountain is so long. Were there this many switchbacks last time? 

What's with my lower back and butt muscles? My strong, flexible hip flexors are tight and in full-refusal mode.

Breathe. Keep a steady cadence. Back and butt in unison: No! Stuff your steady cadence. 

Maybe if I stretch. I arch my back, then stand up on the pedals to release tension. Breathe into that area. 

Ha. Steady cadence for thirty strokes. Maybe I fixed it!

Are those people passing me on mountain bikes?? Yes, they are. Oh my god. Brené was right. Comparison is the death of happiness.

I want survival. If I survive this, I will require nothing of myself when I get home. My bed.

My bed!

Don't let yourself burp too deep. Oh nausea. My foe. 

And then I am - hallelujah, forever later - at the top. And I can stop. I unfurl my back. I see Strong and Stronger. They have ridden well. We compare notes. They are so nice to me, brainstorming to solve my pain, saying they've been nauseous on this ride, maybe I am not a sucky weakling, but rather am feeling crummy because of my second vaccination shot. What lifts my spirits most is the reassurance that there's not much more uphill left on this ride. 

Eat? No. My stomach flips at the thought of it.

I struggled through and made it back to the parking lot and my beautiful, beautiful car. An hour later, I was in my even more beautiful, luxurious bed.

The ride totaled 42.95 miles with 2987 feet of gain. I affectionately titled it "Lookout 43 Barf" on my GPS. I will get stronger. I believe that. It's just gonna be some painful miles between here and there. Gulp.

Vax Day

It's here. Vax day. It feels historical and monumental and shivery all at once. What a life-changer this last year has been. Remember the first days of mask-wearing and the other-worldness of stores and streets full of people wearing masks? Now I startle when someone is not wearing one. Ugh, anti-maskers and all the  political undertones. Past TV scenes of large groups together not wearing masks stirs an ache in me. Wow, it used to be like that... we could do that without ramifications.

I am super-curious of what we'll learn in the years to come. Why do some people who get COVID-19 end up on ventilators while others suffer only mild symptoms? Shoot, why do some people have a stronger adverse reaction to the vaccine than others? I hope some investigative journalist will canvas this virus's path and write a book like Randy Shilts's, And the Band Played On, chasing down every thread and weaving together the psychology of how Americans reacted to the threat of this virus. There are definitely parallels between this pandemic and the AIDS epidemic: people who want to deny the bad news, people who don't want to change their lifestyle if it doesn't directly threaten them - or even if it does. Then there are the ones who understand early, and try to get out ahead of the virus, the champions for reason and health and science. In both epidemics, Anthony Fauci is/was a key player. In both, the reaction to the virus became highly-politicized. Which saddens me. I wish humans could be more objective about health issues.

And I think where I have been with this... super-scared at first. I remember going back to WI in March the week that "Shelter-in-place" entered our vocabularies. I was shopping at Home Depot with my elderly father (who is already vaccinated, yes!) and was making sure I was the one touching items and not him and trying to hurry through the store to get him back to the safety of his van, receiving texts from family members warning us that the virus could live on surfaces for days and that we should wipe down everything... To fights with my Quarantine Partner over how safe we needed to be... To now where I barely worry about surface spread, but wear a mask whenever I am indoors with other people. To now where I am comfortable being at school with half of our students reporting each day, and look forward to feeling safe when 100% of them are in person. The dream of 100% in-person was unthinkable until vaccinations. 

That is the other piece. The students through this. Some have played a yearlong game of hooky; others have reached out to their teachers and are thriving academically. Most have found a way to get their social fix - whether it be in the Zoom calls with me (!) or connecting with cousins or friends. Tiktok needs a medal. It gave students a place to be goofy - or glamorous, as they presume. In either case, it has connected kids. And we will need to reconnect many of them to academics. What will this look like? I'm ready to figure it out. 

Rolling up my sleeve and ready.

FireBelly

 It's starting. The fire in the belly. I signed up for the Elephant Rock century ride and two weeks into training has taken me places... 

Ouch places when I first got on my bike, my old reliable Burley Pine Grove. No longer made, it's vintage and catches the eye of every bike dealer who I let work on it: "Oh, they only make bike trailers now." Sexy. 

Anyhow, the ouch was between my shoulder blades. Excruciating after 20 miles in the saddle and the pain staying for 2 days. So, I started looking for a bike fit and a new bike. My local guy took one look at me on my bike (outside of the shop for COVID safety) and suggested two tweaks. Some hundreds of dollars later as there were other issues, I had a new-looking bike on my hands - and much reduced shoulder pain! Miracle worker.

Ouch places... riding with my sister and our other friend who are in much better biking shape than I am. I have to qualify this. I am not coming from the couch, but I am coming from the mountains in 2020. I climbed a record 25 last year. Woot! 

Buuuut, that is a different kind of conditioning than saddle time. So, ouch. On the hills they killed me especially hard. I am not clipped in because of my chronic knee issues, but after years of religious PT (and HATING to suck wind behind those two other old bags), I might be ready to try my clips again. Which means back to the bike shop for me. My other ones are so old, I have to believe there are looser-riding, easier-unclipping ones in the world.

And finally, ahhhh places... places where I'm on my bike and I feel fast. Not one with the bike, not that yet, but I remember that I used to have that feeling. I get glimpses of it and know I'll get stronger and feel faster.

Places like last night, rolling up and down the hills around the countryside, reveling in new roads to ride. 

This morning... waking up and wanting to ride. Ready to ride. Ready to do this thing. I have a good case of fire in my belly.