April rides

When the weather’s right, as it was all this week, there is really nothing better than a spring bike ride. The air is just warm enough and the sun warms your body the rest of the way — you can feel the earth gaining heat, rather than losing it. The air is clean, and you can really feel your progress from ride to ride as you gain back the legs you lost over the winter. Of course, the downside is that all the roadside trash is highly visible — those washcloths that kept appearing last summer haven’t gone anywhere. The roadkill count isn’t too bad — three or four newly dead possums, a couple of slightly more dead cats, and in what I can only consider some kind of a conspiracy against me, four randomly placed banana peels appeared along yesterday’s route. The headwind was tough going out, but I rationalized that I’d get it back on the way home — which is of course ridiculous. The wind always changes before you get back, and it did yesterday, too. Plus, I felt so good that I let myself get a little lost, and took a really roundabout route that brought me up into the wind again on the last leg. The last eight miles, out of about 34, were just painful, but that’s how you get better. I missed out on the hard hills of spring last year, being too preoccupied with home repairs, and then never had my climbing legs all summer, so now’s the time to do the work.

Took my “new” bike over the 2000K mark this week, not as impressive as some people but not too bad overall. Now if I can just keep convincing myself to get out there. Despite the fact that I’ve NEVER regretted going out on a ride, it takes a herculean effort to conquer my brain’s objections — too cold, too warm, too windy, too early, too late — and get those endorphins swimming in the blood. My brain, when it comes to exercise, is not to be trusted.