Yesterday was an unusual day. It’s not what I did, it is what I didn’t do. For the first time since mid August, I didn’t ride a bicycle two says in a row. Some of you are thinking “so?” I probably should be – but I’m sitting here feeling insecure and like missing 1 day of riding is going to cause me to gain back 27 pounds and not be able to go fast and hate life and blah blah blah blah…. I get this way when I get on a ‘roll’. In the middle of January, it doesn’t bother me, but once I get going and start riding a lot – I get this mental idea that I have to ride more and more and more!
For the past 30 or so days, I’ve ridden a lot. It’s been fun – I’ve got a ton of miles in during the period I am calling “Augtember” Since I really didn’t ride the first half of August, I’m bonding those two months together to create a 30 day period that hence forth and furthermore, I will affectionately call “Augtember”. During that period, I’ve ridden 31 times with a mileage total over 700 miles. I’ve ridden in blistering heat and today, I rode in knee warmers and long sleeves. The full month of Augtember is over on September 15th. I’ll probably finish off someplace in the realm of 750 miles. Some would say “Wow, that’s awesome” but stupid brain thinks “You didn’t ride yesterday – you sucks”. It’s that mentality that at times will get me to go “Screw it, I missed two days – why bother today” which leads to three, four, six and beyond.
This is another one of those boring looks into how my warped brain works. The thing is, when I confess this oddity and see it written down on paper and come up with good thought like “You took two rest days. You were a little crunchy the first few miles of today’s ride, but you will feel better on the way home.” (A generally normal, well balanced look at reality – if I do say so myself.)
The current plan is to continue my commuting quest until I run out of light. I don’t know that I will try to force a round peg into a square hole with lights and stuff. I may shift gears and work on a little running and riding during the day – keep up a weekend ride and stuff. We will see.
The hardest thing for me, sometimes, is to just sit up and ride my bike. Stop racing my computer or trying to average a certain speed. I think I need to get the fixie set up and ride it for a while. All these gears are starting to mess with my brain cell!