I put in my time this afternoon and then, when I was done and entirely frustrated and sick of my computer screen, I went for a ride. This was a funny ride, because I did two things: I went faster than I have ever gone by myself over a significant distance (36kph average over 65km), and I thought about some things. Usually the two don't go hand in hand, but today they did. When I lugged my bike on my shoulder through the front door John took a look at me and said "Wow Matt, you must have been going really hard, you look spent". Then I sat on my front steps in my bike shorts with my shirt off drinking my water bottle until I stopped sweating. For whatever reason there were about 50 little birds fluttering around pecking at the ground and tearing off pieces of grass. Sometimes little fights would break out over a prized bug or a stick that might find a useful role in building a nest. I wrote some code to imitate birds flocking in flight last year, and that always makes me think about the dynamics of riding in a group of cyclists and the amazement of the swirling coordination of 50 sparrows being scared into flight by a passing car. Something else I thought about was the fear I find pleasure in when I ride my bike. Three motorcycles roared past me tonight, and to be honest I've never really understood motorcycles, but I imagine that at least part of the reason people sit on a piece of metal they can send flying across a skinny slab of asphalt at 200+ km/h is that they enjoy being afraid, and finding the strength to withstand that fear and rev their engine another few thousand rpm's, launching their consciousness at ever more insane velocities (that was a long sentence). For me, riding a bike is not about the magnitude of the speed; only occasionally will you get up to 80km/h or better, and that's usually after spending an hour climbing up a mountain going 15 km/h. So it's not the speed I'm afraid of; it's not being able to make it, just being shattered and falling off the pedals without any more energy to turn the gears another inch. Maybe that's too dramatic, but every time I go out on my bike there seems to be a point where I ask myself to keep going when my legs are just screaming and feel like they're ready to explode. Fear probably isn't the right word, but something like it, maybe it's just the voice or Fear telling me to quit. I have to try my best to block it out, but I'm not always successful. Tonight I was though, every time I asked my body to get out of the saddle I did. Whenever I could click into a bigger gear and push my legs a little harder, I did. I measured my resting heart rate the other day and it was 43 bpm, which is apparently pretty low and means that my heart is pretty strong. When I have to stop at a traffic light after riding for a while my heart feels like it's going to shake my body apart. There are days when I look down at my legs and I don't know how I got to this strange place where I'm pushing myself the way that I do. I look down and think that those aren't my legs, that's not my bike, that's not the asphalt ripping past underneath it all. The last hard section of road on my ride tonight heads east, and with the sun setting over my shoulder, my shadow was dancing ahead of me as I climbed up the final few hills. Tonight I didn't feel disconnected or out of place, the dark outline draped on the road was me, this was my bike, those were my legs, and I wasn't listening to Fear whispering in my ear.
I've also been teaching this term, filling in for a prof who is on sabbatical. To say the least teaching a class of 90 second year engineering students has been an experience...The course was about social factors in design. A lot of singing and dancing in front of a presentation screen, but overall a good experience.
