I seem to be on a three month rotation here - December, March and now June - already! There was a time when I posted every week, even a month when I posted every day - anyone remember NABLOPOMO?
Life rushes by, I mean to post something but then, in a blink, three months have passed.
Time for an update.
We dusted off our bikes in January and have been riding ever since. The OC bikes every day - going for land speed records! He never does things by halves whereas I, apparently, do, as evidenced by all those half-made quilts. Finishing them has become my mission. The clock is ticking and the thought that they'd be carted off to the nearest thrift shop upon my demise fuels my determination, this year as never before. So I half-ass the biking too, going not every day but every other day. Which not only keeps it relaxing but leaves time between for quilting, reading, gardening, yoga, navel gazing and, at least once every three months, blogging.
In the early months the weather was perfect, short sleeves the order of the day. I went out early yesterday in long sleeves, even though it was already eighty degrees. Having spent my childhood in raincoats and wellies, I love the sunshine here, but I burn. And freckle. And wrinkle - and how! And this in spite of slatheration with high SPF sunscreen. So - long sleeves from now 'til cooler days return. I like and respect Dr. Dermatologist, but I'd rather not give her any more business.
So there I was, a sight to warm the hearts of alien children in search of their mother from whom they'd been separated when their UFO landed - There she is! There's our Mama - in that driveway over there! But they're wrong, of course. I'm not an alien, I'm not their mother, I just look like her.
It's the helmet.
The OC insists I wear it even though it flattens my hair. He also makes me wear fingerless biker gloves. At lycra though, I draw the line.
As I peddle down the driveway I note that we have clouds this morning, piled high on the horizon, soaring above the trees, mountains of woolly grey with silver tipped tops reaching up to where there is nothing but blue. I'm glad of them, they'll keep me cooler. There's always the chance,of course, that they'll blot out the blue and dissolve and I'll come home like a drowned rat. But I'll take that chance.
The OC rides for at least twenty miles, even on days where he says he's going to take it easy. The man can't help himself. Habits of a lifetime. And me? On my every-other-days? I peddle faster or slower depending on how much, or not, my knees ache. And when I come to a hill I downshift, and zig-zag, which always brings to mind The Mag. Sr. Margaret was a Kerry woman. She taught us Irish and in one lesson we were reading, in Irish, about a donkey and how, at a hill, he would, as the Irish phrase put it "take both sides of the road with him" meaning he was doing the same zig-zag as I was doing now because he was a clever fellow and knew he'd climb more efficiently that way than if he tried to go straight up. I take comfort in knowing I'm at least as smart as a donkey, and I'm sure The Mag must smile Up There to know that I still remember that long ago lesson.
And now the driveway is in sight again. It's been an hour, give or take five minutes. The clouds cleared. The long sleeves protected me from sun and wind. I don't feel like a drowned rat but I do feel like I'm melting. I glug some water, remove my helmet and stagger inside.
