Let’s see… today is Wednesday the 23rd of July. I wrote the post below Sunday or Monday, prior to writing the last one already published, and for the life of me could not upload it. This whole blogging experience is brand new, first-time-ever stuff. For instance, I can’t control picture image size, and so far I haven’t figgered out how to “approve” replies. So Annie and Samoa and anyone else who’s replied, I’m not blocking you, just have no idea how to manage this new medium.
I have a good metaphoric way of framing the balance, from my occasional perspective as an Old Fart: I carry with me a cell phone that does a bunch of other stuff, some of it quite useful and entertaining and some of it kind of mindblowing as well. My kids each carry handheld computers that also happen to send and receive phone calls. It’s the same device, but a different way of seeing.
Don and I share some common life experiences. We’re the same age, married with three kids all entering or well into early adulthood, and fairly tall, skinny, healthy and strong. We have a deep and consequential shared history around our love of bicycles and bike touring. We’re also a couple of gettin’-old farts (“speak for yourself, Allan.” “Oh, OK, Don.”), used to decades of doing things our own way. So touring together is a meeting of disparate styles and quickly finding ways through. Example: Don told me this morning that he likes to rise early and get on the road by 8 or 9 am, and earlier than that if the day would be hot, and finish riding by 3 pm. I’m OK with that, but would be slower to get going. I appreciate his telling me!
And we have one other shared treasure: other than occasional short visits, the last in 1997, we have lived our respective lives out of contact with each other and in different regions of the continent. So we can check in on our lives, share our stories, lessons and failures with each other as fellow pilgrims, with an essential mutual caring but little past influence on each other’s lives after our five years or so of time actively shared as friends. This opportunity won’t come again, as we’re not likely to do this again in thirty years. As Don said today, “We’re 75% of the way through our lives!”
Midsummer’s day, Santiam River in the Oregon Cascades
Don at the Quartzville Creek crossing on Forest Road 11, the world-class bike route up into the Cascades between Lebanon and Sisters.
We had an absolutely fantastic ride today (Sunday). Don selected a minor road into the the Cascades where we saw osprey, trout, deer, turkeys. Before long the road shrunk to one paved lane with turnouts, so the few cars we encountered seldom exceeded 20 mph. Much of the 50 or so miles we rode today were gently uphill along the tributary of the North Santiam River (I think).
Once we headed out, I had no cell service for a couple of days, and expect this to continue across Oregon.