Back in the Saddle

Monday, I got back to some roots. 
I took my poor, misunderstood Nuella to the place I had found myself as an adult. 
i.e. I took a bike ride where I went to college.

There's a prairie reserve behind Briar Cliff, and it's one that I crossed often to get to the cemetery where my dad's grandpa was buried.  (My great-grandmother was buried there after I graduated.)  I'll save the story of how I found Calvary Cemetery for another time.  I had decided that I needed to see someplace that wasn't Omaha, because I couldn't remember the last time that happened.  (Thanksgiving, I think, so a good 6 months.)  So I decided to drive up to Sioux City following my participation in the Boys Town Memorial Day Run.  (The term "run" is used loosely.)  I completed the 5 mile race in 1:14:28.  I had been hoping for under an hour, but it was raining at the start and I stopped no less than 4 times to tie my shoes in the first mile before it ocurred to me to double knot the darn things.  Most importantly, it's less than last year's time of 1:17:17.

 

I got a little giddy as I pulled into the empty parking lot and looked at Toller Hall, the building I lived in for 4 years.  I went up to the entrance of the prairie reserve to make sure there weren't any signs prohibiting bicycle usage.  Nope.  Just motor vehicles.  I took Nuella out of my car and smiled as I saw her and Toller together.  I rolled her the few hundred feet to the gate, popped her up on her hind wheel and navigated her through the entrance posts.  (They're like the kind you see at tennis courts.)  I set her down, hopped on, and...went about .02 miles before I realized the trek started uphill.

I made it to the other side of the prairie and tied her up to a fence post.  It was awkward enough entering a cemetery the back way, I didn't need to be wheeling a bike around with me, too.

I sat with my family for a little bit and realized that my great-grandmother lived almost 40 years as a widow.  I can't imagine waiting that long to be with someone again.

I'm confident I rode Nuella more on the way back from the cemetery than I did there.  Partially because I was now more confident navigating through the ruts (helped to put the seat post down a bit), which were so deep in some places that my pedals were bumping against the grass while in the 3 and 9 o'clock positions.  (I walked through those.)  Partially because I was emotionally rested from visiting a place full of final resting places.

At the top of hills, I would grin and give a reverent, "Yeah!"

At least once I shouted, "Whooooo!" 

Too Legit to Quit



Does this show how deep
the ruts are?



On the second-to-last decline before the end of the ride, I realized that this was the kind of riding Nuella was meant for.  This is what made her happiest, and here I've been taking her on road rides.  There have been times, I admit, that I resent Nuella in a way, for what she reminds me of.  Taking this personification of a bicycle a little deeper, I didn't want her when I first got her.  But I grew to love her the way I loved all of my bikes.  Eventually, the one responsible for bringing her into into my life left us, and there are moments when I'm with her that it's hard to forget that.  Not that those memories are painful or bitter, but, well, some memories are best left tucked away.  Sometimes being with Nuella brings such memories to the forefront of my mind, where they don't belong.  As a result, sometimes I resent her for that. 

(Yes, I'm aware this makes it sound like I've might've gone off the deep end, but I assure you I know how to swim.)

Being on the Sioux City Prairie with her, though, there was none of that.  It was the first time I had been there on a bike, her first time there, and the first time she and I had gone off-roading just the two of us.  The whole experience was new for both of us, and we bonded over it.  It was a liberating and exhilirating experience.  And I have the pictures to prove it.



"I took the road less traveled."



"To infinity, and beyond!"