I MISS THE DARK
TODAY WAS THE FIRST TMWC SINCE THE TIME CHANGE. It was lot lighter, which meant more cars on the road early… but that quiet pre-time change dark is not what I’m missing. I’m missing the dark side of me.
Last night I went to bed ticked off.
No reason, really.
Tossed and turned all night, and was comatose when the alarm banged and banged and banged.
I stumbled through the rituals.
Weighed myself, was happy to be 2 pounds lighter than yesterday and mad that yesterday was the heaviest I’ve been in 3 years. 177!
Got rolling right on time.
Threw it in the big ring to get up to speed and the chain went right over and off the ring. It jammed so bad I had to stop.
Normally, this is not a big deal.
But, since I’d had the shop work on my bottom bracket last night only to screw up the shifting in the process… well, dang it fellas… can ya just stick with fixing what’s broken and leave out the breaking what’s working? I was doubly mad, because I asked if they’d need to adjust the derailleur… my spider sense was telling me to test it, but I trusted them. Shame on T.
Then, I round the corner and see the guys at the meet up to ride to TMWC. Right on time they leave, 5:54AM. Which is cool, because I’m only about a minute behind and should be able to catch them before the super sketchy 1 lane road… sketchy because the cars are a little nuts in the morning and there’s K-rail on each side with no bike lane. It’s a lot safer in a group.
I carefully throw it in the big ring and I can hear the crank clicking on the derailleur each pedal stroke… which reminds me how ticked I am at poor service, AGAIN. Which means I get to do the entire ride in the small ring. Yeah’nt.
Back to the small ring.
I’m going really fast, way faster than I want to go this early into the ride. My “friends” are getting further ahead. Thanks guys.
It was nice to have a car right on my back wheel all the way down the super sketchy one lane section (what if I’d flatted?… I’d be flattened). And even nicer to see the light at Antonio turn green just in time for my friends to make it and me to miss it. The nicest part of all is that this is a 5 minute light, an extra-crazy-busy intersection with everybody up so early. Which meant I got to go the rest of the way by myself and remember how ticked I was at the world… isn’t that nice?
I got to the ride in time, easily.
Everybody was happy it was light already.
But, I was dark.
And, I remained that way most of the ride. I’d brighten up, then be spinning so fast in my small ring (put on that darn 34T for LoToJa) things would get dim.
Good thing though, if I ride long enough eventually the dark will pedal away. Sure I was still ticked at whatever it was last night, at the ballast I’ve added, at the shop, at myself for not listening to Spider sense, at “friends” for going all out at the start just to prove a point about leaving on time…
… but this darkness has woken me out of my post-LoToJa slump…
… no more skipping rides, no more backing off when it hurts, no more eating crap, no more blaming others for my bikes’ performance…
… where there is darkness, there is fire…
… and where there’s fire, there’s smoke…
… and someone’s getting smoked…
Which reminds me how great it was to be forced to spin really fast, how useful that kind of training can be and how it keeps your legs from loading up, keeping them fresh for the final efforts…
… like the KOM I snagged on the way home by giving in to my dark side…