Friday, March 15, 2024

Hesher

Here’s how time is (or, at least time periods are) an illusion: If you’re doing the same things, talking about the same music, and modifying your consciousness in the same way as you did half a century ago then, for all intents and purposes, now could be then.

If you didn’t know that it was the end of the first quarter of the 21st century rather than nearly the beginning of the last quarter of the 20th, you couldn’t tell merely by observing when what was happening and who it was happening with was happening.

Sure, there would be clues: the bicycles would mostly be sturdy gravel bikes instead of scrawny ten speeds; the conversations about the music would be informed by being able to listen to it anywhere, all by yourself, piped directly into your years instead of having to be in someone’s bedroom sharing the vinyl experience together, and the consciousness-altering delivery system would be hash-infused pre-rolls purchased from a retail establishment rather than seedy ditch weed rolled in American flag papers at your high-school desk, but if you removed all those frames and simply examined the shared consciousnesses, who could tell?

And frankly, who would want to?

If we can time-travel by bicycle back to “simpler times” (that, really, weren’t all that simple what with way more street crime, lakes so polluted they caught fire, a US President resigning for complicity in a crime and its cover-up, plus bike tires that weren't nearly so flat resistant as today’s, even for those who have yet to make the conversion to tubeless), then shouldn’t we take that opportunity?

Even if it means that the “fire” is made from aluminum cans and Girl Scout water instead of driftwood and deadfall; even if it means that the ultimate expression of the irrational number is arrived at too late to do so.

Because that still means that then is now and now is then and all there ever is is.


Friday, March 8, 2024

Theme

I miss the old days when nostalgia was so much sweeter, don’t you?

In other words, we used to be so cool, didn’t we?

Remember how a Thursday night ride used to take you to the farthest reaches of county, through a hidden riparian zone or up some spookily forgotten bluff or over a decaying bridge to a place you’d never even heard of, much less ridden your bike to near midnight and well into the wee hours of the morning when the birds began chirping at the rising dawn?

Nowadays, a little wiggle in and over a familiar wooded trail and up and around to what just might be the watering hole that, in terms of elapsed time, you’ve been going to for longer than any other one in the whole darn town, is sufficient for a first act, and then, the usual back way to what’s become, more or less, the default spot in our fair city for tidy little bonfires, makes for a perfectly satisfactory Act Two in the overall production that, while it may not win an Academy Award this weekend for Best Thursday Night Ride ever, certainly gives you your money’s worth in thrills and chills, not to mention LOLs and chuckles, plus a few poignant reminiscences, as well.

And that’s fine, really, because another benefit of having done a thing for so long is that any comparisons one might be compelled to make with the past are shown to be no more relevant to present satisfaction than are tomorrow’s aspirations to yesterday’s joys; it’s all water under the bridge or sand through the hourglass or whatever other metaphor you want to use; what matters, really, or all that there is, as a matter of fact, is the moment you’re in and if you’ve gotten there by bike, and it includes fellowship and libation, then who cares if it isn’t what it was because it is what it is and that’s plenty.


Friday, February 9, 2024

Sprinkle

One of the most important dispositions to cultivate in Philosophy, (and in life), is what we usually call “epistemological humility,” or “epistemological humbleness.”

It’s the attitude which recognizes that even if you’re relatively sure of your belief or position, you could be wrong—an appetite for being shown that one is mistaken and a willingness, even hunger, to change one’s views as a result of new information or evidence.

In some ways, it’s the mindset of a scientist, who looks forward to their hypotheses being falsified, since that’s where real advancement of knowledge takes place.  

As the 18th century British Empiricist philosopher, David Hume, reminds us, we can’t ever be certain of the predictions of inductive reasoning, but we can be sure when we’re shown a counterexample that disproves the principle upon which our predictions are based.  

That’s why even the most settled scientific claims, like evolution, or plate tectonics, or even gravity, are called “theories.”  If someone comes along and finds human skeletal remains in the same fossil strata as trilobites, then, all bets are off, Mr. Darwin, and we’ve got to revise our thinking. 

Anyway, with that in mind, you make an effort to not be overly dogmatic.  Sure, you’ve got an end in mind—even if it’s one that apparently was a destination not too long ago—but that doesn’t mean you’ll only accept one way to get there.

And if the route upwards includes a double-helix shaped corkscrew to the concrete front yard of some big-city condominiums, well then, all right.

And if it also involves a beach “fire” that’s pretty much just the ignition of lighter fluid from a squeeze bottle on top of some sticks, sure, that’s fine, too.

Not every rain shower has to be a downpour (thankfully); sometimes a little sprinkle is all that’s needed.

And if the “ride” is mostly hanging out in a beloved (albeit recently visited) watering hole and making new friends, that’s plenty, as well.


Friday, January 12, 2024

Hooray

Of the four traditional elements—air, fire, earth, and water—it’s only that second one which inspires human beings to dance around and cheer.  

(Oh, I suppose there could be times when a dust devil or tornedo might give rise to happy feet for air; and maybe a waterspout or big wave could inspire frolics over water, but you know what I mean.)

Perhaps it’s because, among the four, it’s only fire that is manifested through human endeavor.

(And sure, flames can also arise without the help of homo sapiens, through lightning strikes or volcanic eruptions, but you see my point.)

In any event, it’s clear that when human beings do create fire—admittedly with lots of help from air—especially when near a grand body of water, (especially on a night when the earth beneath that water is especially apparent), and the flames from that conflagration rise to great heights, and the sparks from that blaze scurry over the ground to turn a duck pond into a celestial light show, that it’s impossible for men, women, children, and everything in between, not to cavort merrily, even if that’s only on the inside, while others can’t help vocalizing their joy, exclaiming “hooray,” “huzzah,” “yippie,” and “wow.”

Of all the holiday traditions, maybe the best is the one where you mark the end of the holiday season by setting ablaze the remnants of the holiday season.  

There’s something marvelously cathartic about witnessing dozens of artifacts, which only a few days earlier, had been the centerpiece of a family’s festivities, give themselves up to the process of oxidation, releasing heat and generating combustion products to the great amusement of all the assembled humanity.

The chilliest night of the year so far becomes almost too warm for comfort, and if that’s not a metaphor for our shared aspirations, I don’t know what is.

(Well, perhaps gilding the lily with explosives atop the coals, but there are limits, even though often exceeded.)


Sunday, December 17, 2023

Tradition

Yes, of course, Christmas is an over-commercialized nightmare that has nothing to do with the original spirit of the occasion.  And, sure, Hannukah is pretty much a made-up holiday so that Jewish kids don’t feel left out during December.  And everybody knows that all of the contemporary religious festivities associated with the season are just pale reflections of the original pagan celebrations conducted by our early human ancestors.  

It’s all just a big marketing ploy by society, organized religion, and commerce to sell shit at the end of the year so that annual quotas can be met and healthy bottom-lines secured.

But it’s all okay by me if it makes possible some of the following:

  • Congregating at the diviest bar in the fanciest part of town with several dozen friends and acquaintances, many you haven’t seen in a while (if not longer) to drink pitchers of beer, pile gifts on a table and make bets on the outcome of televised fights

  • Rolling uphill en masse, plenty of bicycle-mounted Christmas lights blinking away, to our fair city’s largest and spookiest park

  • Fanning out on two wheels through said park in search of comfort stations and selfies

  • Getting lost at least three times in the woods, following different colleagues more sure than you they knew the way, but no more likely than you be to be right

  • Finally making it to the sought-after sylvan glade where a cheery blaze awaits and an endless amount of combustibles is made available thanks to strong arms and sharp teeth

  • Taking the easy way out by following that cargo bike

  • Arriving at an old-favorite watering hole to take over the entire outdoor patio for the sharing of presence and presents for all

  • Singing a song that normally aggravates but when shouted together sparks joy

So, yeah, the holidays are stupid and stressful and overhyped but when that disaster yields disasters like these, then you gotta believe that holiday miracles are real, praise be. 



Friday, December 15, 2023

Adaptive

As human beings, it’s all we’ve got going for us, really.

We lack the wings of the eagle, the speed of the cheetah, the strength of the elephant, even the uncanny resilience of a simple virus.  What we do have, though, more than any other of Earth’s creatures, is the ability to adapt.

We can build igloos in the Arctic to keep us warm; we can divert huge bodies of water in the desert for hydration and irrigation; we can cut down great swaths of forest for housing and agriculture; basically, we can adapt the entire world to our needs, so that we can be anywhere, do almost anything, and survive under conditions that would be a death knell for our stronger, faster, and more arial fellow beings.

And it all begins with changing our minds.

You can see this in practice on the last Thursday night of autumn in the Pacific Northwest, when initially, the proposed destination is just about creature comfort and slack, but then, is adapted to an indoor location northward.  

But then, it makes sense to pivot for a gander at last week’s scene of the crime, which leads to thinking a brief stop by the water is in order, which is modified to a proposal to visit a supermarket Phoenix risen from the ashes, which suggests that congregating at the nearby park shelter is the thing to do—by not that route, but that one—where at first, it seems like fire will be eschewed, until, thanks to improvisations with both liquid and solid petrochemicals, a cheery blaze is established, around which lots of different ideas for the future can be tried out, until it is time for the final adaptation of the evening, one that doesn’t even require a cover charge as it turns out.

An eagle would gone higher, a cheetah faster, an elephant stronger, a virus simpler but none would have adapted so well as a human.  

Yay, us!


Friday, December 8, 2023

Presence

https://tinyurl.com/52fmsjkk
Maybe you’re drunker than you think, but not that drunk, so  we’ve got to blame multi-tasking which is stupid anyway especially when it involves professional sports, and is impossible, as well, since we can really only think one thought at a time, right?

But then there you are, your friends’ cries of surprise and disbelief echoing in the background, as you find yourself tits over teakettle splayed out in the puddle.

Nice bike to save your stupid ass; thanks, Grant!; the Haulin’ Colin rack an unintentionally (or maybe intentionally) perfect front roll-bar, as well.

You’d been congratulating yourself all this uncommonly wet week for staying dry, employing booties and plastic and even two rain jackets simultaneously in the effort, but all is lost when you fill your bag up to the brim with leftover rainwater scooped by the fall. 

Also, it feels weird to ride without the leg strap dropped earlier in the day; you should have expected the unexpected.

Which would you rather have?  A favorite team’s loss or a broken collarbone?

Like Jack Benny said, “I’m thinking…”

But, duh.

You never know quite how you are until the next day or maybe later.  What once took six weeks could be eight or even forever, so you’ve got to be careful and all that more grateful when your lack thereof isn’t punished too harshly.

It makes you wonder what’s going to really do us in: our own stupid mistakes or the stupid mistakes of others.  Probably both, and that’s why.

There’s no use complaining about what all turns out okay in the end, but it’s still fun to talk about it, especially in the company of those who are no less pleased than you by the lack of injury while simultaneously being glad that they’re not as soaked as you are, either.

In order for a thrilling victory, you gotta have a thrilling loss; sometimes, though, you get to—go to—have both.


Friday, November 17, 2023

HIp

You appreciate people who are more awkward on two legs than they are on two wheels.

Heck, you’re one of them!

It is heartwarming, though—and flabbergastifying, as well—to see how deeply the years pile up.  

Once upon a time, half a decade was a long time; these days, three times that is just a blink of an eye, and you realize, around the subsequent fire, in that most secret and lovable of destinations, that you’ve been at this for even longer, but somehow it still seems—if not brand-new—at least novel in its own way, every time.

What’s that old saw?  The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result?  

If so, then what do you call doing the same thing over and over while hoping for pretty much the same thing once more, that being flames and fellowship, saturnalia and bacchanalia, bikes and beer and bud, and eventually, a pain-free wobble home that sees all uphills flatter than usual and all downhills longer than you remember?

Thursday, maybe?

The “bicycle community” is a pretty big tent and one thing that’s kinda cool about that is the way in which a tiny little company started by a couple of those aforementioned awkward two-legged two-wheelers can make such a huge positive difference to that tent—as well as providing lots of ways to carry said tent to the great out-of-doors as desired.

You don’t have to be an avid consumer to be an avid consumer of the consumables you avidly consume and you can wish that the stuff you like would never go away, but it does, and there’s not much you can do about that other than celebrate all the joys that stuff has made possible, even as seams fray and zippers break.

Time, they say, heals all wounds, (and perhaps wounds all heels, as well), but with a bike, it just seems to happen so much quicker.


Thursday, October 26, 2023

Enough

When you realize that the part where you had to carry your bike up the steps was completely avoidable had you just gone around the corner is what it’s all about at least some of the time: mistakes are learning experiences, except that quite often enough, had you been paying the right amount of attention, you wouldn’t have had to make those mistakes in the first place.

It’s a strange day, right in the middle of something that could be; so, you’ve got to appreciate the effortless effort like the Buddhists, I think, remind us of.

It’s good to be persuaded; free will is an illusion, anyway.  We are programmed to believe we are not programmed.  And that’s part of the program, too, isn’t it?

David Chalmers says that the philosophical progression is from Materialism to Dualism to Panpsychism to Idealism; that makes sense: in the end it’s all 0’s and 1’s in the mind of God, anyway, but you’ve still got to love the internal experience of seeing that almost full moon over the top of the building that used to be something else, below the hill that once was another, right?

Finally, at the end of it all is the beginning of something else. There won’t be anyone left anymore to decipher what’s left.  It will be way more like biology than anthropology for our octopus descendents.

But if they’re lucky, they will have something analogous to the bicycle.  They’ll suction cup their eight legs to a device that has the same number of pedals as their octilateral symmetry and carry on over the crumbled remains of Seattle’s oldest bicycle path, just like in those moments somewhat before midnight on a perfectly dry fall evening in our fair city just days away from the full moon with lots of leaves turning their brightest red before falling to earth within the next few days; and then you’re home and glad of it because, after all, enough.


Friday, October 13, 2023

Dumb

In retrospect, it seems like a perfect metaphor for American foreign policy, or Napoleon’s catastrophic siege of Moscow, or maybe a co-dependent relationship with someone you just can’t quit: you know that the way forward is impassible, but you just keep going, becoming deeper and more deeply mired in the literal and metaphorical swamp; your mind—and a more reasonable colleague—tells you that you’ve got to turn back, but you neither take its advice nor their example, until finally, you just have to give up, as you should have almost right from the start, and return along the terrible way you came, only this time uphill.

Thank Heavens for taller and stronger comrades who lift you and machine up out of the mire and over the fallen barriers or else you would have found yourself trapped in the dark until someone else found you, who knows how long later, your rotting corpse eaten by maggots and worms, that last warm beer still in your bottle cage, dripping ever so slowly into the earth.

So, maybe it wasn’t quite all that dire, but it sure felt like it for much of the way back, until at last, asphalt re-appeared and there were only hills to contend with, no more slippery plank bridges or blackberry branches swatting and scratching your face.

Type 2 or Type 3 fun? Maybe some of both.  

In retrospect, the steeper-than-remembered mash up the back way to the Little League fields was swell; the Joseph Conrad-style descent into the heart of darkness, though, maybe you could have done without, although the starting trails that led one astray like that were impeccable.

But, anyway, it surely pays to do the dumb thing from time to time, if only to remind yourself how easily it is to be dumb and eventually, how dumb you can be.

And, perhaps, most importantly, how lucky you are for the chance to be dumb, and grateful you are, as well.


Friday, September 22, 2023

Backtrack

Of course there are worse things than backtracking along a route you’ve travelled earlier— global climate change, child abuse, country rock, getting hit by a bus—and since, as the ancient Greek philosopher, Heraclitus, famously reminds us, you can never step into the same river twice, therefore, there really is no backtracking, (it’s always forward-tracking even if you’re revisiting the same path); it really is silly to complain about instances of the dreaded “out and back” that legendary Point83 wayfarer, the sorely-missed Joeball, himself, usually made it a point to eschew; moreover, when the route is plotted out, more or less, by another legendary wayfarer, you probably should just embrace the direction whatever it is without being grumpy, even in jest.

However.

You can’t deny that once you’ve ridden by or past somewhere that it’s even more delightful to find a different way onward, especially if the way there affords you a spectacular view of the handiwork of the simulation designers, who, once again, here in final throes of summer, are pulling out all the stops to make things so very pleasing to the eye, that you can’t help thinking they’ve gone a bit overboard once more with the lavender mountain, the perfect crescent moon, and all ferry boats on the water just for show.

A perfectly-timed timed flat gives you something to do while drinking beer and chatting at the well-lighted park structure beneath the technological marvel that spans our fair city’s industrial artery and since the time spent and intoxicants ingested mean that your mind is no longer in the same place as it was an hour or so earlier, the way back is no longer the way there after all.

Which just goes to show that no matter how many times you do the same thing, it’s never the same.  Like those indigenous faces projected on the city park leaves, a slight breath of wind, a single fallen leaf, and it’s all brand new.


Friday, September 15, 2023

Sparkle

Shirtsleeve weather all evening on the last Thursday of summer; a pleasant ride featuring a different route to Beacon Hill; a cheery little fire overlooking our fair city’s industrial core; and getting rousted out of a gathering spot for “trespassing” only once.

But, of course, the big story in town wasn’t this, but, rather, the stadium concert of Queen Bey, which filled downtown with silver sparkle aplenty (and which you could hear all the way from Jefferson Park when there wasn’t a plane overhead or an eighteen-wheeler using its compression brakes on I-5).

Wow. Words fail.


Friday, September 1, 2023

Ceaseless

This quote, pulled from the Northern Light, the 16-page in-house Christmas 1934 publication for Northern Light Insurance: “‘The old order changeth, yielding place to new.’ How better exemplified is the law of ceaseless change than in the long road traveled from cave to skyscraper?”

Yep.  

Back in 1929, when the Northern Life Tower opened its doors to the public, the new art-deco skyscraper must have seemed like the perfect exemplification of Seattle’s ceaselessly changing landscape and an ideal illustration of how far our fair city had come from the aspirations embodied in its older, slightly taller, sister, the Smith Tower, whose neoclassical design would have appeared appallingly dated in comparison to the new building’s distinctive, ziggurat exterior, clad in thirty-three shades of brick designed to effect a gradient which lightens from the bottom to the apogee of the building.

Nowadays, you get a similar feeling for the impermanence of all existence when you stand atop the never-before-assayed tight-spiral parking garage as the sun turns a few wispy clouds golden while viewing the nearly hundred year-old building and reflect upon the imminent demise of a not nearly as impressive physical structure soon to be swept aside by our condominium overlords, a rumination that does, at least, provide a plan for where to go next, which is, after all, just what you’re hoping for from the present most of the time.

You’ve got to keep moving if you’re to get anywhere, especially when there are deadlines to be met and, as it turned out, just the right balance between forward and sideways was effected to make the preferred mode of crossing over possible.

Sunset Hill Park, lovely as always, was really more about the moonrise and how the lunar corona expanded like heavenly watercolors across the sky as Earth’s satellite ballooned upwards.

And then it was off to the aforementioned doomed water(wheel)ing hole.  Still there for now, but soon to changeth, yielding place to new.

Yep.



Friday, August 25, 2023

Leisurely

The good thing about getting slower with age as a cyclist is that you get to spend more time on the bike.  

A commute that used to take ninety minutes now requires almost two hours.  That’s close to another hour in the saddle a day, which means that many more opportunities to turn the pedals and admire the natural world.

Or when out with the bike gang of Thursday night in late summer, you get to take enough time longer to arrive at the chosen destination that not only are you able to enjoy your own leisurely pace throughout, it’s also the case that the fire is already blazing by the time you get there.

It’s no doubt just a matter of time before your lack of alacrity requires the remedy of an electric motor, but that eventuality is to be postponed for as long as possible, knowing, of course, that once it’s availed of, there’s no turning back.  However, it is a good piece of advice, courtesy of the child friends’ friends, that one should reserve the motorized cycle for the onerous tasks, thereby providing less incentive to “flatten the hills,” as it’s often put.

As long as you know where the group is headed, you’re never really lost; you’re just on your way to being there.  And if this entails an interim stop at the home of departing old friends, so much the better.  You’re not in a rush if you’re not in a rush and if the journey is the destination, then you’ve always arrived.

As the dog days of August come to a close, you want to squeeze all of the last remaining nectar out of summer in every way possible.  That means you never pass up an opportunity to swim nor a chance to do the crazy old man dance around the fire.

There are probably things burned that don’t need to be burned, but if that slows down departure, why not?


Friday, August 11, 2023

Meteor


Well, we didn't see any flaming rocks illuminating the heavens, but you-know-who was plenty lit up, so...success!

Also, "Pleiadeez-nutz" does get funnier after the 7th or 8th time.

That is all.

Friday, August 4, 2023

Measured

It’s reassuring to note you can still sufficiently derange your consciousness with the latest iteration of the homemade shortbread weed cookie that you’re unable to light the ceremonial departure joint; it’s not quite couchlocking to Larks’ Tongues in Aspic, but close enough.

And it’s heartwarming to have friends and acquaintances who are sufficiently thoughtful and appropriately ambivalent about wayfaring that they’ll circle around traffic circles and campus fountains to give you time to catch up.

So, who cares if the rent-a-cops in their military-grade bullet-proof vests care a lot more about where you’re permitted to hang out than you do?  

After all, there’s a great big world out there, complete with its very own freshwater lake perfect for barely-waning supermoons to rise out of, so even though that concrete platform five stories up would be perfect for catching the last few rays of sunlight while quaffing a cold one, the prudent thing to do is just—as is so often the case—let the baby have their bottle and head elsewhere.

No point in arguing with those who won’t listen to argument, as Monty Python reminds us.  

If they’re going to cite unjustified rules to justify their position, then they’re no longer doing philosophy, they’re just doing their job, whereas you get to ride away and still enjoy the downhill corkscrew, which was half of the point, after all.

I can see how it must seem that having this much fun and beauty and natural wonder ought to be against some rules, somewhere.  

If I were on the outside looking in—especially if I had to gear up for my hourly (no doubt, non-union) work in polyester olive drab and combat boots—I’d probably want to put the kibosh on such shenanigans, as well.

But that’s why you’ve got to get out on two wheels instead of the company-issued toy jeep; when your head’s in the clouds instead of your ass, you see whole lots more.


Friday, July 21, 2023

Lux

If you saw a painting of last evening’s sky looking west over Seattle from across the lake on Mercer Island, you would surely accuse the artist of mawkishness, of gilding the lily so to speak, of taking it over the top in a way that was unbelievable and honestly, downright silly.

The striated horizon in colors of fuchsia, goldenrod, lavender, lilac, and plum would be enough, really, but then, add in the smoothly rippled surface of the lake, undulating softly beneath, not to mention the two-dimensional backdrop of noble trees and downtown skyline; all that would make for a picture that was too beautiful to be real, but then, paint in that perfect little fingernail sliver of a smile for the waxing crescent moon, and you would look at the overall effect and scoff, thinking that the artist had jumped the shark in their composition; what is this Thomas Kinkaid bullshit, no actual sky ever looked like that; the only heavens that might appear so lovely would be the actual unreal Heaven itself.

I mean, really.

But goddamn if Nature herself isn’t a true cornball, because, so help me God, it was all there, making your jaw drop at the exquisite pulchritude of the scene and your heart hurt at the incredible good fortune you enjoy to be able to witness it instead of roasting for 19 straight days of over 110 degree heat in Phoenix or some other dying city in the West.

One does what one can to express gratitude for such bounty, even if that’s just switching to bamboo floss picks at a minimum, because it’s not just what you do, but how you do it, and when you do what you do by riding bikes to get there, you clearly earn a few bonus points, which you are able to immediately cash in by swimming not once, but twice before the night moves on to another phase of unreasonable, unbelievable, extravagant beauty.


Friday, June 30, 2023

Source

In some ways, not that much has changed since 2006.  

Beyoncé and Mariah Carey are still making hits, the Seattle Mariners remain mediocre, and you can continue to tune into new episodes of The Simpsons on a regular basis Sunday nights during the school year.

But lots has changed, too: there are way more flavors of Cheetos than back in the “Aughts”; you never saw a radio-controlled flying drone lift off the ground vertically and soar over Elliot Bay in those days; and the Seattle Big Wheel didn’t dominate the downtown shoreline of our fair city, whereas the viaduct, may it rest in peace, did.

Jack Block park was there then and already provided its unsurpassed view of the Seattle skyline, (almost equaled, we’ve learned, however, by the vista provided from the pedestrian bridge over Harbor Island’s main thoroughfare), although its shoreline wasn’t, at that time, accessible to humans (other than those like the legendary Daniel Featherhead, who was able to fly down and up from it—just like a drone!)

Nevertheless, seventeen years later, there’s still nothing like being out on your bike, during a perfect summer evening in Seattle, with pink clouds turning orange and red to the west, drinking beer and smoking weed, telling lies and doubting claims, just as you did verging on two decades ago, before the iPhone even came out and back when people still believed the US Supreme Court was a legitimate component of our government’s famous system of “check and balances.”

I hadn’t even hit the half-century mark that first time I ever stood on the magnificent concrete platform suspended about the Superfund site, and yet now, at closer to seventy than sixty years of age, I still delight at way it vibrates when those mighty cables are shaken.

Quantum physics—or maybe just South Park—tells us that time is an illusion; past and future don’t exist, there’s only the present and my, what a gift it is!


Friday, June 16, 2023

Script

A Broadway theater actor does eight shows a week, Tuesday night through Saturday, with a matinee on both weekend days.  And yet, somehow, they great ones keep it fresh, as if they’re saying their lines for the first time, every time.

A schoolteacher typically teaches the same subject, year after year, same content, same questions, September to June throughout their entire career.  And yet somehow, the best educators make their subject matter come alive no matter how many times they’ve covered it before.

And pity the poor IT help desk person: how many times are they asked the exact same question from another person with the very same computer problem they just solved moments before for someone else?  And yet, somehow, the really helpful ones manage not to be snide when suggesting that the offending CPU be powered off and on just in case.

The same sort of principle applies when it comes to Thursday night rides.  

After all, you may be following a route followed many a time before, complete with the requisite spin around the Seattle Center “ghettodrome,” a spin up to the nearby parking garage rooftop pea patch, the standard massing up by Seattle’s fanciest restaurant and the usual sunset crossing of the scary bridge that’s way less scary en masse, but even while doing so, it’s important to find new wrinkles that make the usual unusual, like riding higher than ever before in the bowl of the fountain, or taking a more roundabout route to the top of the parking structure than is typical, or for once, not spreading out into a long thin line, but rather, staying pretty packed together as you cross over Fremont from above.

And never before was it that if Derrick don’t come to the ride, the ride comes to Derrick, the result of which was an oft-visited firepit hosting a blaze started in a way it never is anymore.

And what’s old is new all over again.




Friday, June 9, 2023

Imperfecdt

Sure, in the perfect world, (assuming, contrary to old Dr. Pangloss, it isn’t this one), the first swim of summer would be on a perfectly clear day with temperatures in the eighties, but if it takes place on a comparatively cool and overcast evening on which the early-season water temperature was a degree or two warmer than the air, that’s plenty good enough.

And yes, of course, on the ideal Thursday night out on two wheels, no one from the group would miss the start, leave early, or be dropped or misplaced, but when, thanks, in part to the new technological beacon as well as old skool cellular phone calls, everyone eventually convenes, then what’s to complain about, really?

And no doubt, if one was scripting life to have all the dials turned up to eleven, then the single-track meander through the woods would be longer, greener, would include a water element or two, and the only sounds you’d hear would be the chirping of birds and the ratcheting of pawls, but even with a soundtrack and the dust, it’s plenty rad, especially given its urban setting and accessibility.

Moreover, one can’t deny that the Platonic form of campfire isn’t composed of logs made from pressed sawdust engraved with the name of that fragrant city to the south, and probably doesn’t involve the combustion of fluids best left to internal combustion engines, but honestly, you’ve got to admit that with enough lighter fluid and sufficient determination to see flammable things in flames, the minimum bar for success has not only been achieved, but surpassed.

Agreed: a sunset where you can watch our nearest star descend all the way to the horizon, sparking that mythical “green flash” is the one you’d hold up as the apotheosis of such events, but surely one which paints the entire western sky achingly lovely hues of purple, fuchsia, and pink and makes cardboard cutouts of the city skyline ain’t half bad, either. 


Friday, June 2, 2023

Gizmo

When someone makes that classic assertion, “I may be dumb, but I’m not stupid,” I take them to mean  that while they might be dull or uneducated, at least they aren’t willfully ignorant.  You can fool them once (or they can fool themselves once), but shame on them if you fool them (or they fool themselves) a second, third, even 327th time.  

The dumb person screws up because they aren’t the sharpest tool in the shed, but they learn from their mistakes and exercise greater discrimination and acumen next time around.

If that’s the case, then you can certainly count yourself as one of the stupid, because after nearly 500 Thursday nights out on two wheels with the usual suspects, including a truly vintage collection on the most recent one, all you’ve really learned from your mistakes is how to reliably make them again and again and again.

Good judgment is probably overrated, anyway, and indubitably, the concerted exercise of stupidity results in many more memorable memories, many of which you can’t even hardly remember, along with all the ones that, despite your best efforts, you’ll never be able forget.

It was, indeed, an unforgettably beautiful spring evening here in the Upper Left, with an almost full moon blotting out all but the most persistent stars and planets.  We won’t be surprised to see the typical “Juneuary” upon us at any time, but for right now, at least, wool and Gore-tex remain in the bag all night.

And in spite of a tendency towards technological Ludditism, one has to hand it to the satellite tracking gizmo that made it all possible. You would have ridden right on by had not the little round “Drain” button shown itself on your mobile screen.  

Welcome to the 21st century, it ain’t all bad.

“You can’t fix stupid,” goes the old saw, and to tell you truth, it’s not obvious you’d want to; think of all you’d miss if you did.


Tuesday, May 23, 2023

Amblin'

It’s fun to note how much fun you’re able to have in a little over 24 hours.

From the very first moment when you arrive and can begin your day by amblin’, not ramblin’, around the vast marketplace stocked with all sorts of delicacies from Asia and around the world to enjoy breakfast sushi and inari, along with friendly kibbitzing and joshing, the enjoyment begins.

And it’s always amusing to be the first vehicles on the ferry, two wheels good, four wheels bad—or at least slower.

Surreptitious spirits and canned beer on the float over to the the Peninsula always bring a smile to one’s face, especially when they afford one the opportunity to remotely toast an onboard wedding celebration.  Yay.

Sure, the harrowing several miles along the glass and nail strewn freeway aren’t so great, but when they’re almost immediately followed up by a cold tallboy at the somewhat unfortunately named bar and restaurant, all is good.

Bike touring is fun, in spite of the heat and cars, at least when you’re ramblin’, not amblin’, on old forest highways with a state park as your initial destination.  It’s so nice there, you could take a nap; only the promise of more fun on two wheels impels you onward.

And here’s what really a gas: swapping your human-powered vehicle for a gas-powered one just before the hills become really steep and exposed.  And what’s fun about that is it means you’ve got plenty of energy in camp for more amblin’, not ramblin’.

Thanks to Mother Nature for producing the mycological molecules that turn even the silliest of phrases even sillier: “Ketchup or die!”  “I teach 4th graders!” “Bungie cords hate bikes!”

And doing a little bit of Ian Anderson for the birthday boy: is that fun, or what?  Yes!

Moreover, in the morning, it’s still not over.  Beer, bud, and bacon for breakfast.

Country music and Exile on Main Street in the packed pickup home.

Fun!


Friday, May 19, 2023

Blithe

 

Percy Bushe Shelly’s inspired poem, To a Skylark begins with the line, “Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!” which inspired the title of Noel Coward’s inspired dark comedy, Blithe Spirit, thus demonstrating that inspiration often comes from inspiration, especially when that inspiration is inspired by time spent among the inspirational glories of nature.

The internet tells us that the poet and his wife, Mary Shelly, (author of Frankenstein; or A Modern Prometheus, and daughter of the early feminist philosopher, Mary Wollstonecraft) were wandering among the lanes in Livorno, Italy one summer evening and heard the caroling of a skylark.  

The poet puts it like this:

Higher still and higher

From the earth thou springest

Like a cloud of fire;

The blue deep thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest. 

 

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

O'er which clouds are bright'ning,

Thou dost float and run;

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

Pretty good stuff to be sure, but one has to wonder how much more lyrical old Percy would have been able to be had he and the missus had bicycles to ride that night, especially were they pedaling not around the hedges and bowers of a port city in Tuscany, but rather, through the industrial core of a port city in the Pacific Northwest with that warm spring light lingering late and making shadows grow long.

In that event, he might have waxed rhapsodic over the way the sun sank to a perfect point behind the Olympic peninsula with the skyline of Seattle in the foreground and he could have directed his apostrophe not to a skylark, but perhaps towards a seagull, whose crepuscular cries may not inspire such pathos as those of the genus Alauda, but which nevertheless offer a perfect accompaniment to the view.

Bring it home, Perce:

Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow

The world should listen then, as I am listening now.


Friday, May 12, 2023

Instead

Surely, there are better things to do.

You could devote your evening to the cause of global human rights, taking whatever means necessary to curtail widespread human rights violations under El Salvador’s “State of Emergency,” or in Ukraine, where Russian forces tortured detainees in the city of Izium, or in India, where police killings are routine and endemic.

Or you could make music.  Or art.  Or write the next Great American Novel—or at least Pretty Good Local ‘Zine.  Or whip up a delicious four course meal using only items procured by bicycle from your local Farmers’ Market.

You could watch a hockey game.  Or some basketball or baseball.  Or surf the Worldwide Web for videos of cats.

You could even just take a nap—with or without having had a few drinks beforehand.

Instead, however, you ride your bike to the usual Thursday night meeting place, quaff a lukewarm brew while noting the musical choices of the resident hobo DJ, and then spin across the manmade industrial waterway to climb up a parking garage whose football-field sized roof affords a stunning view of one slice of our fair city just as the sun sets behind purple, fuchsia, and pink cirrus clouds.

You then skim the University and public transportation’s space-age infrastructure to meander on two wheels along the usual meandering path before provisioning up at the generous local retailer.

And then, along the taken-for-granted trail through the woods to the giant park where frogs sing your welcome and all are reunited for a short wiggle along the water to the secret glade.  And that’s where you congregate for the next little while or longer, enjoying the unseasonably warm evening in what’s shaping up to be a remarkably remarkable spring, at least in the weather department.

So, you could have made the world a better place.  Or cooked a spectacular feast.  Or seen your favorite team lose or prevail as the case may be.

But this instead.


Friday, May 5, 2023

Stimulation

Perhaps death really is an illusion and our dearly departed loved ones are hanging out watching us from behind that gossamer veil separating two worlds, one for the living and one beyond.  

If so, then they, too, would surely enjoy the view from the highest and most classic of our fair city’s concrete temples devoted to the storing of automobiles, with the added bonus, for them, of not having to decide whether to experience the full 360 degrees out in the elements or a more constrained horizon behind the protecting parapet.

Such trade-offs mean nothing to an ectoplasm through whom the spring bluster blusters freely.

Sometimes, it makes sense to only plan ahead one step at a time; you can trust your future self to come up with something it will prefer when the opportunity presents itself.

Our hopes and dreams make reality real; if we love hard enough, anything may be possible, even reanimation; revitalization is certain even without the metaphysical baggage.

The lowering of the Lake, just over a century ago means that here in the 21st century, we are walking on water our hundred year-old selves would have had to; and if that’s not miraculous enough, consider, in the fullness of time, that the moon is so, as well.

Some days just overflow with sensations: a familiar cycling route made easier due to the power of anticipation; a classroom where real connections are made; local infrastructure working as designed for crosstown access lickety-split; dreamers dreaming onstage and a little luncheon to boot; the usual usual, as usual; happy hour feeling happy; then up and over all over again.

It’s a good thing that our eyes are bigger than our stomachs.  While this may, as Mom knew best, cause minor hiccups or even upchucks in a literal smorgasbord context, metaphorically, it’s all for the best, as it means that no matter how much you see, you can always see more, just beyond that infernal curtain.


Friday, March 17, 2023

Midway

 

“Half a loaf is better than none.” (Anonymous)

“Well begun is half done.” (Ancient Greek Philosopher, Aristotle)

“It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish.” (Seahawks Football Coach, Pete Carroll)

“If you’re having half as much fun as me, then I’m having twice as much fun as you!” (Comedian, Ralf Leland)

So, you see, it doesn’t matter—at least half the time—to miss the start, as long as you can find your way to their middle, even if doing so requires you to ride a route that you would never have ridden if you weren’t on the lookout for the assembled.

But: 

“All’s well that ends well.”  (Poet and playwright, William Shakespeare)

It wasn’t the longest of rides (for me), nor was it the warmest of fires, but it was still plenty of everything, with some water, some fire, some air, some earth, and even some ether: all five elements coming together to be plenty enough, even halfway.

Just like this.


Friday, March 10, 2023

Slow

Thanks to the gusting southerly wind—and the traffic lights—it was the slowest descent of Second Avenue ever.

But that’s okay.

Because that same gusting wind—although not the traffic lights—was responsible for stoking the smallish campfire to a forge-like hotness, and gave rise, ultimately, to the always hoped-for, but only occasionally-realized, fountain of boiling accelerant: always a marker (though neither a necessary nor sufficient condition) of a swell night out on two wheels.

It was the last nighttime meet-up of the year, thanks to the imminent arrival of this weekend’s springing forward, which means for the next six months or so, it will be just a little trickier to find a place to relieve oneself early on during the ride, which might be TMI, as it’s called, but is, nevertheless, an observable fact of life in the Great Northwest.

Just as the observation that—at least in my experience—it had been months, if not more than a year, since Ye Olde Wading Poole Firepit by the shores of Lake Washington, just south of Thee Poison Oak Farme had been visited, led to the observable fact that there was probably no better place to be at the time, if I do say so myself, and I do.

So many possibilities present themselves at the outset of an evening and you’ve got to shuffle through the options until one escapes the deck and presents itself.  

It can be less-than-exotic to find oneself, therefore, on a well-trodden (that is, pedaled) route, but there’s something to be said for rolling down streets that are familiar to one’s daily responsibilities in a different frame of mind.  

With the right perspective—and the proper dosage of various varieties—the usual can seem quite unusual, and unusually attractive as a result.

And, at the end of the evening, if there you are, slowly grinding up a street you grind up several times a workweek, you're going plenty fast enough.


Friday, February 10, 2023

Karma

In an Chapter 7 of his introduction to Vedic philosophy entitled An Idealist View of Life, Sarvepali Radhakrishnan, the esteemed philosopher and former president of India, argues that the doctrine of karma is compatible with human freedom because, although karma links us to our past lives, we still have the creative power to shape our life though the choices we make.  

He uses the analogy of a hand in the card game Bridge to elucidate this. We are dealt a hand at birth (due to our karmic debt from previous incarnations), but we can play our hand as we wish (we have free choice to do so, within the constraints of the cards we’ve been dealt).  

Radhakrishan concludes by observing that belief in karma makes us more compassionate toward the less fortunate.  We should not feel superior to those who are faring badly because we share the human frailty that, through karma, led to their misfortune.

All of which is to say that anyone who has the opportunity to ride their bike around Seattle on a reasonably warm and mostly dry evening in February, and end up at the shore of our fair city’s great lake to enjoy a cheery little bonfire, with beer, conviviality, and friendship, ought to be especially compassionate and deeply grateful to their previous incarnation, who must have been a pretty good person to have afforded them the opportunity, in this incarnation, to be able to do so.

Whoever I might have been last time around was likely a way better human than I am this time around; otherwise, how could I have ended up so lucky?  Makes me aspire to be as kind and compassionate as I can so that whoever I am next time around gets similar opportunities for two-wheeled shenanigans; one can only do their best and hope.

And who can say, anyway, whether reincarnation really happens.  I’ll just enjoy and appreciate this hand I’ve been dealt, and ride on.


Friday, February 3, 2023

Exactly

Back during the years of the Obama Presidency, when I was a wee lad in my fifties, it was rare that a Point83 ride wouldn’t have me finally arriving home around 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning.  

There were many miles to pedal and several watering holes to get to before the night was over; sometimes not one, but two outdoor fires, with often a final one after the bars closed at the beloved Fremont Firepit where people would pass out or nap for a bit before their eventual wobble home.

Ah, youth!

These days, by contrast, I’m satisfied with an evening that hits all the high points and checks the requisite boxes: some sort of street-level nonsense at Westlake, a ramble along the waterfront, a new parking garage in which to quaff a (apparently stolen) cold one, a massed-up bridge crossing, a very quick, but highly-enjoyable conflagration, and finally, a single bar, for just a little bit.

Back home in bed well before midnight, but it’s plenty.

And these days, who needs a full 327 words?  About half that is fine.


Friday, January 6, 2023

Good

One of the wisest aphorisms, if you ask me, is “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”

All too often, this admonition is forgotten, and you refrain from actions that would be just fine—or even better—simply because they don’t stack up to some preconceived notion about what ought to be.  This doesn’t mean, of course, that you don’t have standards; it’s just means you don’t use those standards as a cudgel to crush opportunities that present themselves, warts and all.

Case in point: 

Sure, the Platonic Form of post-holiday combustion events involves something like a hundred fir trees stoked up into a massive conflagration sending sparks and embers several furlongs into the sky.  

And yes, in the proverbial perfect world, every single rider would arrive at Westlake with some flammable remnant of the Christmas season strapped to their body or bike.  

Moreover, the idealized version of the evening wouldn’t include even a minor crash occasioned by the embrace of pine needles rolling down the avenue.

However.

The real world isn’t like that.  If life gives you lemons, as the great Beyoncé reminds us, make lemonade.

Or, in this case, a perfectly imperfect bonfire.

There was that ten-minute span, when the first few of the apparently sparse offerings were giving up their carbon, while the rain came down in sheets, making you feel like the idiot your mom always said was too dumb to come in out of the weather, and it seemed like that was all there was, night over.  

At that point, you might have concluded that since this wasn’t all that, then it wasn’t anything, and gone home, blinded by your vision of what should be to the wonder of the actual.

But in doing so, you would have missed at least a dozen more contributions to the communal pyre and a full moon so bright it made double moonbows in what became a perfectly dry night sky.

Perfect.