An essay from last year.  Because it is finally the sort of weather that is really good for biking.  And because this one makes me smile.

Cycle


I learned how to ride my bike in the parking lot of the high school up the street from my house. I was a flash of yellow and white streamers, cautious at first and then really moving, flying over parking lines and potholes and spots of smooth gum, aged into purple grey, black, faded pink. We were a family on bikes, leaning daringly with one hand playing tag, chasing down the ice cream man, balancing backpacks filled with library books.

When I was fifteen, my dad handed me my first jersey. I had outgrown streamers and tag, but I had not outgrown my need for him and so I wore it in our first race and his smile at the end caused me to look differently at my two wheels, to look down with a little love. When I was sixteen my brother and I rode with him across the state and it meant enough that it became a tradition. At seventeen I biked my first century ride. Twenty-three my first mountain. And the rest is wild history.

My dad grew up in dirt, in a small town, in the middle of the prairie. He rode his bike to the country school up the hill and he rode it home again. One time he tried to run away from home, but when you’re small, miles seem large and so he turned his bike around. He told me this story the first time I pedaled across Nebraska with him. He told me a lot of stories and I found him inside of them, I began to understand who my father was.

Week long rides have their own sort of cycle. The first few days it feels like what you’ve set out to do is impossible or at least impossibly hard. Your legs don’t work for walking, and as much as your whole body aches, it’s your rear end that is least forgiving. You learn to sit gently, gingerly, sparingly. But by the third day you begin to smile, to feel strong and beautiful in that strength. And at the end of the week you’ve found tent buddies, a pack to draft with, and a plan for the next year that is already grand in the making.

The cross state ride in Nebraska usually covers from 450 to 550 miles in a week. Unlike the party state to the east, Nebraska’s ride is relatively small and low key. Around 600 bikers camp at night in the football fields and parks of whatever beef-raising, corn-growing small town the route arrives at. Churches compete with potluck spreads, spaghetti dinners, taco bars, watered down orange drinks. We favor the Methodist churches; they’re a safe bet for seconds, thirds, fourths. Tent zippers start singing at 4:30 am and twenty miles down the road sharpied signs advertise eggs and bacon in the next eager town.

They say the ride across Nebraska in the summer of 2001 was the windiest in their twenty year history. It was the year of high temperatures and low food supplies, of barn dances and ballgames and of streams of riders pedaling directly to the pool, taking halves of seconds to lean frames against the chain fence and then running, breaking the water with sweaty, spandexed bodies.

When I was twenty-three I said goodbye to most of my life, packed the rest into my car, and moved to a small town in the mountains, to a classroom of tiny faces. That summer, my dad came out for our ride; I had found a journal from a group of women who cycled around the northern strip of Idaho, through the mountains and the lakes and along the river. They made note of the best places to eat and to sleep, of the smoothest roads with the widest shoulders. We spent the first part of the week climbing passes, racing around trees, exploring forgotten towns. He guided me, centered floating questions.

We had pizza and beer on a deck by the water with one of my good friends after we made it back. She had a lot of sadness in her family and while we were eating he looked at her. He told her that her dad probably didn’t understand how to say it. He told her, “You're a good daughter. Your dad is blessed to have you.” The look in her eyes and the way her face crumpled is something I do not want to forget.

I dropped him at the airport at the end and after he hugged me, he said one last thing. “Tasha, you know what I like best about you? Your giggle. I forgot how much you giggle.” He didn’t understand that it is because I am gloriously happy on a bike, happy to be young again, darting through time, miles flying behind me.

National Geographic’s Adventure magazine featured a route two years ago that I clipped and mailed to my father. It takes riders through the countryside of Austria, on roads with wine stands by the side, around beautiful buildings that used to be something. It is a five day ride and the article insisted that it is a ride that should not be missed. He called me and said it would be our finale before he walked me down The Aisle. I said I wasn’t getting close to an aisle or a ring any time soon and I could hear the smile in his voice when he said, “We’ll see.”

My father’s father was not kind with his words. My dad says he was a good man, he just did not understand what love sounded like out loud. I remember his brown creased skin. The way his hair was parted on the side in slick black waves, the hugs heavy with the smell of Old Spice. My grandfather died putting his boots on, one morning his heart just quit. The first time I saw my dad cry was when he started to tell us. And it shook me.

My dad is the oldest and when they all get together, his brother and sisters, they stay up late. They turn into children talking about their parents, all the crazy things they did. And I can see it in their faces, raw need as they share what they remember with each other. Over and over and over. Then they say what he couldn’t. They say those words they needed to hear years ago, words they will always need to hear.

There’s a documentary called “Take a Seat” that was shown in The Banff Film Festival last year about a cyclist from England who flew to the tip of Alaska and rode to the tip of Argentina. He had a two thousand dollar budget and twenty thousand miles to cover in a little over two years. The best part of it is that he rode a tandem bike, a bicycle with two seats and two sets of pedals. He said that he wanted to make friends along the way. News spread about what he was doing; people followed his story and then people started flying. Traveling from their homes to the city he was in, just so they could ride with him.

When he was asked later what the best part of the experience was, he said it was the people he picked up on the way.

Last month the Ladies and Gentlemen’s Bike Club hosted a ride through the downtown of Omaha. Everyone wore their best tweeds and fanciest frills and used words like jolly and dandy. They are trying to make a presence in Omaha for all bikers, to keep the streets safe and the bikers safer. After the ride they sipped tea and shared a box of donuts. My father was working out of state and so I went alone, but I left with the boy who had the best outfit. For me, biking is relationship.

I found a shoebox outside my door a few days after I moved back. Inside were two shoes my size and a new set of pedals. I found him right away, he is the type of father who is constantly in the garage, and I held the box out to him, my eyebrows raised. I practiced in the driveway. He held the bike steady while I clipped in, clipped out, clipped in, clipped out. First the right, then the left. He talked me through it, retaught me how to use pedals, my feet. We rode down to the river after. I grew braver and he challenged my pace, soon we were soaring, creating wind that moved leaves and startled indignant birds into conversation. His favorite part is always the birds. “Tasha, listen. Do you hear them? Aren’t they great? He made them for us, you know.”

Earlier this week my dad asked for my social security number. He said he was going to add me to his insurance for a few months until my next birthday and I outgrew the new age of dependency. I cringed because it meant there is no longer a good reason to avoid the dentist, but later that day my parents sat me down and they didn’t mention my teeth. I sat there while they talked, watching me with careful eyes. So this is what this conversation sounds like. This is what it feels like. And then I left in my car and turned the music up to hurting loud volume. Hitting my head against the seat whenever my eyes filled.

They told me they’d been worried since I pulled into the driveway, car half full, still mourning the way the earth had flattened and dulled, still saying goodbye and not ready to say hello. They told me I am so quiet. So lost. Quiet surprised me. Quiet? It is loud in my head and I have forgotten this word. I am surprised to hear it, completely surprised.

I came home the next morning and my dad was outside. I was still unsure of myself, scared that the mess inside was bigger than I thought. Scared by their words that echoed inside my head, bouncing around but never out. Everyone needs a hand up sometimes. Maybe for a few months you should see someone, get a prescription. He saw my fear and he hesitated for a moment, he stood there and looked at me. And then he said the best thing. “Perfect morning for a ride, don’t you think?”

The storm inside did not go away, but my resolve fiercened as I whispered, “Just don’t go easy on me. Please, I am tired of people going easy on me.” And we rode as hard as we could and I was young again with streamers, sixteen headed to the next town, twenty-three struggling up the face of a mountain, twenty-five uncertain about life but deeply alive. Twenty-five and comforted by the sound of the wind, the rhythm of the cycle, the presence of him next to me pushing me on.