A Mother’s Resolution - ride more

December 23, 2002 on 2:19 pm | In For Mom's |

All to often recently, I have found myself looking to the past to relive the intensity and energy I once merged while mountain biking.  I long for that feeling of well being and liveliness that cycling delivers.   I look to the past to feel good today.  I look back and remember the time I was being a big shot, zig-zagging down a rocky hill and flew right over the handlebars.  Knocked myself unconscious but could be seen laughing all the way up to the point the unconsciousness settled in.  Somehow this is a fond memory.  I remember how good it felt to be out riding with the guys in college, being the only female able to keep up.  Riding all day long just to see where we could end up and what we could find out near the Allegheny National Forest, which was a second home to us.  I rode my bike everywhere in those days.  Off to class, to the store, to a party at friends, or on an all day adventure seeking out the beauty that was all around me in the beautiful hills of Pennsylvania.  People began to refer to me as ‘the girl on the purple bike’, because I was with it so much.

Cycling introduced me to a more intimate relationship with nature.  I was greatly aware of my surroundings and had to work with them to maneuver around.  It became an escape and I would ride for hours to a special secret spot to ponder the mysteries of the universe… how alive I was!  How good it felt.  My mind, sharp, my muscles, toned and limber.  My senses, on.  I remember riding up to a rock outcropping high up on one of those ancient hills.  What a view!  I could see everything.  One can’t help but feel immense with entire mountain ranges in ones sight.  Entire cities below, one can’t help but feel enormous, dare I say ‘significant’, and I realized that the experience must have a reason for being.  Perhaps we were allowed to feel huge for a few moments so that we could understand our impact and what role we had to play on this planet.  We are huge.  We are caretakers. Our impact is everything and we have to reduce it immensely to treat our planet properly.  I welcomed these loving, nurturing feelings I had for my planet and fell deeply in love for the millionth time.  I swore to ride my bike everywhere from now on and those thoughts were reaffirmed after my peaceful moment was interrupted by the sound of air brakes below.  Noise is pollution too.

None of this should have changed, but sadly, it did.  Somehow I’d let motherhood and the encroaching thirties convince me that these “young”, idealistic feelings were things of the past.  I shouldn’t say I believed such a thing, I just got too good at putting it off.  I’ll get back on the bike soon.  Hyla, (my three year old daughter), will be in school soon and then I’ll have the time and energy. I certainly didn’t feel the energy then, but failed to realize it was the inactivity that made it that way.  Okay, I was aware the inactivity had a role to play, but the time, where would I find the time?  How could I do it while raising a three year old?

Enough with the excuses.  The New Year is here, and this mother has one heck of a resolution, to uphold a promise once made.  Regressing to the past can’t keep a person going and these are things I believe in more than anything. . Shouldn’t Hyla know this?   No time for pondering, no time for exploring, and no time for cycling!  That is no life!  My daughter needs a role model so that she too will be a good “caretaker”.

So, the purple bike is gone, (yes, it was hard to say goodbye) and has been replaced by a nice red one, my prized possession.  And introducing my second prized possession, the Burley Trailer.  I have taken it for a spin and not only do I love it, my daughter does as well.  I am eager to begin our journeys together be they trips to the grocery store, (there is room in the back for two full bags). As she gets older, we’ll take trips to the tops of mountains on bikes. Hello toned muscles, keen senses, and sharp mind.  It will take some getting in shape, but I vow to get myself and my daughter to the top so that she can perhaps begin her own love affair, and she’ll have me to thank for introducing it to her.