Terra Nova

Growing up on a bicycle and having pretty much free rein, I got to know the streets of my village and town in a way that I never expect to know a place again – I not only knew the map of an area of 60 or 70 square miles, I knew who lived in many of the houses I rode by. Even today when I ride through the largely unchanged community, I remember who lived in those houses 40 years ago. I still like riding through the old hometown, and part of it is because it’s all so familiar (because it’s certainly not the challenging ride my current town is).

So imagine my surprise yesterday, riding along a road I’ve ridden along for more than 30 years, when I decided to take a turn I’d never taken and found an entire neighborhood I’d never even known existed. It was tucked in behind the county airport, and if I ever thought anything was there, I’d have assumed it was just part of the airport. Not only was there an entire neighborhood I hadn’t known about, but it has been there all this time. The kids there go to a neighboring school district, so I likely wouldn’t have known anyone from there when I was growing up, but I was still stunned to find all these houses tucked into a place I’d never even thought about.

Back here at home, I’m discovering new places all the time – there are still lots of little roads I haven’t ventured down for one reason or another, but on any given day I may decide to take that wrong turn and see if I fall off the map. As well as I know the four or five towns that I regularly ride around in, I don’t have the rest of the picture that I had in the place I grew up, I don’t know who’s in the houses I’m riding by. (Their dogs, however, are marked on the map in my head. And so is that attack pig out on Sagendorf road).

Beautiful ride yesterday, by the way. Major endorphins, and I’m happy to be on the way to a great spring of training. It started off with a broken valve stem that had to be changed in 25 degree weather, followed by something I’d never done before, scoring a new tube with a tire lever and having to patch it right from the start. But the day warmed up and the tire held, and all was good.