You Had Better Not Be Peeing on My Tire!

Blog soundtrack:

At 9:15 this morning, I met my boy, Bill, on the rail trail. This was "early" for Bill. But, I was glad of it, because I had a busy afternoon. As we stood there, I told Bill that I was not one to exercise before noon; however, these early bike rides really motivated me to do much more during the day. I said, "I'm just not a morning person, but I'm trying to make myself one." He said that he didn't think that was possible; you're either a morning person or a night person. But, he wished me luck trying to transform myself!

Then he said that given my riding, he would never have guessed I was not a morning person. I thanked him, but I divulged that during the first 30 to 45 minutes of the ride, I was really "sleep cycling!"

Bill told me that last night was the first night in a very long time that he had slept with the windows open. His wife has asthma, so during the warm temperatures, they sleep in A/C. Last night, given it was so cool, he opened the windows; , he heard so many sounds (the train, someone's car alarm, and nature in general) that they kept him awake for a long time and woke him up early. It was so early that he couldn't get back to sleep.

I mentioned that I had to shut one of my bedroom windows last night, because at around 4am, I heard the coyotes howling. Bill then said, "Hey, I can send Jim over there with his pellet gun!" I thanked him, but I said I just wanted them to be quiet. He said, "Well, good luck going out there and asking them to be quiet!" and then he laughed.

Yeah, I could picture myself in my nightgown, trekking down the road into the woods, finding the pack, and saying, "Excuse me, but could you guys keep it down? I'm trying to sleep! And, if you can't go to sleep, why don't you try watching Letterman like everyone else? Lastly, I don't howl during the day when you're trying to sleep, do I?" I thought about that, then I laughed as hard as Bill did.

As we headed down the trail, Bill thanked me for my donation to his PMC ride. He told me that while he had exceeded his minimum, by about $2K, it was always good to get more and not because it benefited him; it was because it benefited Dana Farber.

He then told me that one year, there was a chance to get a special 25th PMC anniversary jacket if you raised more than the minimum; otherwise, you just got a white t-shirt with "only a lousy Gatorade bottle on it."

One day he logged in and was shocked to see that he had gone over the minimum. Being a rider, he could check each and every donation. When he did, he realized that his wife had donated $500 to his ride so he would go over the minimum and get the jacket. Bill told me that this jacket was only worth $50 at most.

I could see why his wife would want him to have the jacket. Here was a man who loved to cycle and was dedicated to the PMC ride and its cause; she wanted to do something that meant the world to him, though their definitions of "the world" differed radically!

Anyway, Bill said to his wife, "While I appreciate it, next time you do something like that, could you let me know about it first?" To this day, they laugh about the jacket. Whenever he goes out of the house wearing it, she says, "Hey, be careful with that $500 jacket!"

Bill also had earned a shirt that went with that jacket. When he had his crash a few years ago, they cut off his $100+ biking shorts. When it came time to cut off that shirt, he said, "No way!" The nurse said, "We can't take it off you without cutting it, but it's going to hurt!" Bill said, "No problem!" And the nurse and his wife managed to get that shirt, which he still wears, off of him without cutting it to shreds.


As we cycled toward the Nashua parking lot, Bill tried to tell (no, more like convince me) that the PMC was a 190-mile rolling party. I asked, "Like crack on a bike?" He said, "Yeah!" I knew I could do the bike portion, but I was still not convinced that I could ever raised $6K. He told me that the fund raising was the tough part; the 190 mile bike was the reward. So be it, but I'm still don't think I'm going to do it!

He then told me that Lisa wasn't coming on the ride today. He said, "I think Lisa has low self-esteem." I asked him what woman didn't have low self-esteem. Then he said, "You know how you women are catty?" I immediately said, "Jeez, this isn't about me, is it? Because when I ride, I just ride for me. You and Leigh can both kill me on the hills, and I'm just here doing my thing whether I'm up front or lagging behind." Who was I kidding? I was just biking 35+ miles as fast as I could to make it home to my beloved liverwurst sandwich by 1pm! :-)

But apparently, Lisa didn't interpret me this way, even though I didn't intend any malice or competition. Ten years ago, I would have never thought this way; however, today, I thought, "That's her problem not mine." And, this was not about me being a better cyclist and rubbing it in her face; it was about her not being able to say "I'll become a better cyclist if I ride with better cyclists." That's the way I felt about riding with Bill and Leigh who were both stronger riders than me.

At about the 5 mile mark, Bill asked me if I would mind getting off the trail and riding the roads. I said I wouldn't. A few minutes later, his cell rang, and he said, "I need to pull over and get this." It was Jim. He had cycled almost to Pepperell, but he was now going to cycle back to Nashua to meet up with us.


Five minutes later, two guys passed Bill and I on the road with the lead cyclist saying to us as he passed up by, "Nice day, isn't it?" and then they blew by us. Bill said, "If I were Bob, I'd say they passed us with some attitude and now we should catch up to them." I laughed. And suddenly inhabited by the Ghost of Bob Present, I looked back and Bill and said, "Yeah, let's do it." Within three minutes, I was on the second cyclist's wheel with Bill right behind me. Just then I heard a huge "clunk," and I looked back. I saw Bill's water bottle go rolling across the road. I stopped, and I watched the "'tude" cyclists move on. Bill gathered his water bottle, and we headed to the parking lot.


Bill and I had already logged over 10 miles when we reached the parking lot. We were overdressed; it was time to take a layer of clothing off. I took off my long-sleeved shirt, and then Bill leaned his bike against Jim's car while we waited. I then saw Jim and said, "Jim's coming!'

Jim then shouted to us, "You had better not be peeing on my tire!" We both laughed, and then I thought, "How would I, as a woman, ever be peeing on his tire?" Then, I glanced down the front of my unitard, saw my chest, and thought, "Yes. I am still a woman." It was like I was one of the guys now, capable, if not really, of peeing on a car tire! How cool was that?!


Bill and I then told Jim about the guys with the 'tude, and then Jim said, "I think I saw them just a while ago." Bill and I both said that if we saw them again, we'd give them a piece of our mind, because NO ONE passes the, in Bill's words, "old guy and the woman!" God, what kind of group had I gotten myself into here! Ah, yes, a lovely group.


Jim, Bill, and I headed toward Hollis, NH, because we hadn't been there in a while, and we so loved the hills; okay, maybe they did, but I didn't! But, the route we took today was lovely; Hollis is some kind of wonderland and then some.


We would bike fast, and then there would be lulls. During these lulls, Bill would talk to me about Jeff, Bob, or Kenny. I told him that I thought Jeff was a great cyclist and could even be more so if he had a "real" bike instead of an all terrain bike. Bill agreed and said, "I keep telling him that he looks like a monkey f*cking a foot ball on that bike!" Again, I had to look down the front of my unitard to check for my chest; because, yet again, I was feeling like I was in some strange no person's land, stuck between guy and girl world, given the way Bill and Jim spoke to me!


When we passed by a certain right, Bill would say, "Bob would take a left there, but we're not!" Or another time, it would be, "Bob would go up that hill when you can take the right instead, so we're not!" At times, I felt that at each juncture, Bill should pee on a tree to mark HIS route!


Finally, Bill asked me, "Did I ever mention Kenny?" I said he hadn't. Kenny was one of his neighbors who thought he was a great cyclist. As it turns out, from Bill's assessment, Kenny was an okay cyclist, because Bill did him in on the "hill" (a 1% incline if that) on the rail trail. Kenny had asked Bill recently, "Did you ride with that girl?" Err, yes, I was THAT GIRL.





And you know what? I always wanted to be Marlo Thomas when I was 8 years old!
Kenny asked, "Will I be able to keep up with you?"
Bill said, "She can handle her own."
Kenny asked again, "Will I be able to keep up with you?"
Bill said again, "She can handle her own." Bill then laughed.
I guess Kenny was really asking if I along with them would dust him.

At about 31 miles into our ride, Bill thought we needed to go check out the bridge.

http://www.pepperellinfo.net/coveredbridge/



When we made our way there, there was a huge "Bridge Closed" sign in the road. Bill said, "That isn't for us!" We made our way across the bridge, and there was no one to be found. I said to Bill, hoping to sound smart, you know, these are the same footings from the bridge before from what I could see on the Internet. Bill then said, "No! These look like they are, BUT they are new and were reconstructed to look like the old ones but six feet closer together, because of today's building standards for covered bridges." I stand corrected!

I asked Bill to send me the link to the bridge via email, and he said, "I can remember what I did 10 years ago, but I can't remember what I had for lunch yesterday." I said, "So, I should email you a reminder to email me then?" He said, "Yes!"


After we left the bridge, it was decided that we would have lunch on a bench by the clock in Pepperell. I had no lunch, just a granola bar, but we all sat down and enjoyed the rest. Bill and Jim talked about old cars, Jim and I talked about his cat and my cats (Bill spewed no anti-cat sentiments during this conversation), and then, as cyclists went by, we asked each other in a joking way if the cyclists had attitude. Bill and I based this on our earlier 'tude experience with the two cycling guys. We sat there, someone went by us, and we asked, "Do they have attitude?" as the 80-year-old couple cycling couple passed us. Then, we laughed.

I sat there on the bench, thinking, "Shit, I am one of the guys now. I'm talking about cars, eating, and assessing 'tude!" I was drawn back into reality though, when I looked at both Bill's and Jim's legs while we sat on the bench and noticed that mine were the only ones with razor stubble!

Shortly thereafter, we climbed back on our bikes. Jeff said that he was on his third marriage and then Jim said he was on his second. Jeff said, "After the second, I didn't say like most that I'd never get married again. No. I said that the next time I got married, it would be to a woman who had lots of money and no children. But, then I met my wife; I had no money, and she was in debt with two kids. Twenty-seven years later, we're still together." Hey, the third time is a charm!

We headed for the endpoint destination. About 200 yards before we got to Groton intersection, Jim said, "I have to stop at the Groton Library to check out a book." I asked, "Really? You're kidding?" Jim cycled ahead and veered left at the intersection. I said to Bill, "What is he doing?" Bill then said that he might need to "check out a book" now too. God, I'm so naive. I said, "Why couldn't you guys go in the woods? That's why we women envy you! Hello?" Bill said, "One, it would be hard for Jim, because he wears a unitard, and two, it would be difficult because you are around." Okay, so now I was a dotted line guy!?!?!

I told Jim that I was going to ride ahead so I could get home, because unlike them, I had to get Iz off the bus, clean the house, and get Nathan to his soccer game. I told Bill I'd go out with him tomorrow for as long as I could, and he agreed that we'd connect somehow.

I biked off, got Iz off the bus, cleaned the downstairs of the house, showered, and made it to Nate's first soccer scrimmage by 4pm. Shortly thereafter, I received two emails from Bill. The first was telling me that he just got home after completing 62 miles. I only did 40, and when I read his email, I was thinking, "Oh, male rivalry! I will so bike more than you one day, Bill!" When I got his second email, it was prefaced with, "I know I look like I've swallowed some Goth kid's jewelry." It was the x-ray of his broken pelvis! Hey, the mileage tease, the x-ray of his pelvis, I was now SO one of the guys!

As you may have already gathered, I love cycling with these guys, but today, I realized why. It wasn't for the exercise, the competition, or anything remotely athletic; it was purely for the men themselves. And, I don't mean that in an inappropriate way. These guys, while a bit younger than my Dad, if he were still alive, gave me in three hours every day what I kind of felt I had missed much of my life with my own father -- to be adored and admired by a good man. <3