Rolling hills

 

 

When the fear comes I task myself with doing scary things. I climb on my bike at rush hour and ride the crowded roads semis-delivery trucks-family sedans whooshing my shoulder tensing scan-ahead threats potholes-drainage grates-slick paint-small rocks big enough to pop a thin tire or wrest it from its forward trajectory, and me metal-clipped in, which is for me very close to trapped, and me with breath tight in my chest, and me with shoulders rising, and me knowing if I mess up I could die. So I breathe. I breathe, I drop my shoulders away from my ears, I tuck my bellybutton to my spine and I ride the line. When I've biked for miles along the yellow-painted roads I duck into farmland fly tunnels of drying cornstalks clacking bald eagle soaring blue skies, swirl S-roads dip into valleys looking up to the tops of the big hills--I can do this--pedal my lungs out. Then back to the trafficked roads, quiet now, and I bike home up the long steep hill. And I bike home with the scent of cow shit stinging my eyes. And I bike home against the headwind. By the time I get there I feel strong again.