Passage

Buddhism reminds us that all is impermanent; everything arises and passes away: your life, the human species, even something whose loss will really be mourned, like a beloved brewery that shared its largesse (and brew) on numerous birthday race occasions.

Tempus keeps on fugit-ting no matter (and also because of) what we do to hold onto the way things once were and never will be again.

But that doesn’t mean you ought not to embrace and honor all the fleeting moments you can and take as many opportunities as possible to enjoy them together as they relentlessly slip by.

And surely among the best ways to do so is via bicycle, especially on a perfectly dry and almost moonless mid-winter evening in the upper left-hand corner of the American map of the Northern Hemisphere.

Here’s what that can look like, for instance: 

You begin by circling counterclockwise—as befits this global hemisphere according to Lisa Simpson—down five or six floors of concrete to emerge at our fair city’s most picturesque outdoor waterfront nightclub where beers are consumed and skyscrapers conjectured about.

You then enhance the proceedings with help from Mother Nature (and Farmer Ito) a little farther along the way before crossing over water with abandon and arriving at the aforementioned brewery for the first of what will no doubt be many a last call before the final one sounds.

Afterwards, the sea itself beckons and you answer that beck by raising a cheery blaze to its shoreline which has the additional benefit of providing a shared focus and mutual hearth for a healthy dose of nonsense and an even healthier dose of cannabis gummy squares.

Hoo-ray.

I know this too shall pass—as it all will, ourselves included—but that, of course, is what makes it all so unique and wonderful.  

What’s wonderful, in short, is that it IS unique, despite its common recurrence and familiarity.  

Nothing lasts forever, but there’s forever in each lasting moment.

Beacon

If we’re not here to help each other realize our dreams, then what are we here for?

So, even if you’ve spent a lifetime getting to the point where you can go full-on grouchy old man get offa my lawn mode at the proposed change in tradition, it’s fine to acquiesce to the hoped-for vision of those who are louder and have more intoxicants to share, just so long as you can claim plausible deniability when the inevitable occurs.

Thus, it makes sense to unstrap your own holiday offering and pile it upon the pyre as quickly as possible in order to be able to assume bystander status when the sirens materialize as the grouchy old man within predicted they surely would.

It’s nice to know, anyway, that Seattle’s one-percenters, dining on Sea Bream with Savoy Cabbage and Koji Butter sauce along with Shaved Waygu with Oyster emulsion and ogo powder, have a sufficient sense of civic responsibility to gaze down from their commanding view across Lake Union and alert the authorities that the beacon signal fire atop Weathertop has been lit.

Fortunately, the Nazgul in this case turn out to be the friendliest of our fair city’s finest and enjoy the view as much as anyone while applying the wonderfully-named “wet water” to Christmas embers.

Second-best worst-idea ever in my humble estimation, and considering the candidates for top five include wayfaring closed freeways, riding bicycles through carwashes, and dining and dashing from questionable tabs at questionable watering holes, that’s pretty impressive.

What’s really impressive, though, is that such things keep happening, year after year, and in spite of the usual bumps and bruises, for the most part, the rubber side keeps staying down.

And before you know it, there you are at another conflagration that would have been taboo not so long ago, but nowadays is commonplace in its occurrence, if not its delight.

Fireman: “See you next year.”  

Grouchy old man: “Sooner than that!”