Reason Breeds Insanity

This is always awkward. The long pause between posts. How do I break such a pause? I wish I had a great story to tell, a fabulous anecdote to post, or like Robert Pirsig in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance, which is about neither Zen or motorcycle maintenance but instead about his descent into madness, a life-changing, profound realization. However, I have none of the above. All I have to offer is a short description of house painting, as exciting as watching the paint itself dry. We are almost finished with the porch, which is the most tedious part with the columns and the trim. I hope to finish it tonight. The inside of the porch is finished, but the lattice work around the base of it, and the trim work up around the top on the outside still need to be done. Once the port is done there will three stories of boards to scrape, wash, and paint. Good thing I have all of next week off to do it. I am also hoping to get some work done on it during the week before classes, but at some point I have to write my syllabus, the thing for Debbie, my course website, and order my books. Augh. It never ends, does it?

This is the beginning of a story about my trip. Enjoy it. I did.

There has been no experience in my life that is quite the same as the 1,109 mile motorcycle ride I just took from my house in Muncie, IN to my best friend, Merideth’s house in Sebring, FL. Apparently, the ride would qualify me for the “Iron Butt Club,” which is a club that you can join when you go on a ride of a thousand miles or more. I think this ride should qualify me. I have an Iron Butt now. Winding through Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida, the ride took 22 hours including stopping for gas and lunches, and the majority of it was ridden in the rain, up and down hills and mountains. However, the worst parts of the ride were around Chattanooga, coming down out of the mountains with semis all around me, around Atlanta because Atlanta’s always a nightmare, and the last hour and a half when I found myself dodging old people like Mohammed Ali dodged punches.

When I arrived at Merideth’s house my ass was sore beyond belief, my shoes and my clothes were sodden, and my life had changed. It wasn’t the sort of change like becoming a Christian, where I should feel differently, act differently, or treat my fellow humans with more compassion, but no experience up to this point has been as breathtakingly exhilarating nor as hair-raisingly frightening as riding by myself half-way across the country. I mean some experiences have been similar: willingly losing my virginity, buying a house, and committing to finish my PhD. None of those experiences is quite the same as another, and none compare to submitting myself to the constant jarring and wind-beating of a thousand miles on a two-wheeled piece of steel with a literal fire burning eight inches below my crotch with nothing keeping me from getting burnt by the engine but a four inch thick vinyl seat and a well-loved pair of Levi 501s.

I call my bike Minerva, after the Roman goddess of the hearth. I bought her before I ever even knew how to ride, mostly out of a rebellion and boredom I had felt since the age of 16 and possibly before then. I bought her for the same reason I have multiple tattoos and piercings and for the same reason I never have a “normal” hairdo. Since I had never ridden and didn’t know how to ride when I bought her, one of my students in my youth group rode her home for me, parked her in my driveway, and showed me the basics of riding, like where the clutch, shifter, brakes, and engine kill switch are located. I started riding her before I should have, and I am probably lucky I am still alive, so shortly after I bought Minerva, I took an ABATE motorcycle safety class and learned how little I knew about riding and how much I had to learn before going on those long rides on the wide open road that I had dreamed of for so many years. I was thirty that summer. That was four summers ago, and since then I had put 9,000 miles on her; now I can proudly say that she has successfully carried me over 10,000 miles. This ride, in particular, was exceptional because of the long distance and the rain.

It rained from just outside Indiana all the way to Atlanta on the first day and from about an hour inside of Florida until Sebring the second day. At one point in Florida, the rain was so thick, the downpour so torrential, even cars were pulling off the sides of the road to wait it out.

Mine was FAIR to middlin’! I had so much fun today! To begin my day, I went to the Blue Bottle and had coffee with my friend, Molly, who I volunteer at the Mission with. We sat and talked to a woman who I will just call Amanda Galbraith’s grandma, and it was fantastic. I got caught up on Amanda, Cristin, and Tara and their lives, and their grandma was pretty amazing, too! And Molly and I always have fun, so it was a great way to start the day.

When I left my coffee date with Molly, I went to Sarah and Daniel’s house to pick up Elizabeth. We spent the whole afternoon doing zany things like going to a new seedy little restaurant called Thai Kitchen. I must admit that I liked it better than Thai Smile for several reasons. First, the restaurant itself is sort of small and used to be some kind of greasy spoon diner. Elizabeth and I sat at the 1950’s style soda counter bar instead of a table. Second, our waitress was amazing, telling us all about all the cool stuff of the restaurant and giving us sweet chili sauce to accent our Lemongrass and Tofu lunches. Third, the food was great. It wasn’t filled with sugar, but it had great flavor, especially the dipping sauce for the spring rolls. Fourth, Elizabeth got a Thai Iced Coffee, we split spring rolls, and we each had a good portion of lunch for only $18. Stellar.

When we left Thai Kitchen, we went just up the road a few blocks to Sally’s Ice Cream. I had the best Slushie I’ve had in a long time. They serve the kind that has the syrup at the bottom, the cup is filled with icy sugar-water, and then they mix it with a milk shake machine. You know, the best kind of Slushie ever! Elizabeth got a chocolate covered cherry sundae that looked amazing. All of this for only $4. Of course, when we were finished we had to go thrifting: Meow and Mutt Market, Glass Factory Outlet, and Meijer to purchase clearance items. Essentially, I got two polos and a funny sweatshirt, some mugs/glasses, and a water bottle. I think I spent about $12 or so, so it was a good day.

The crowning glory of my day came this evening when Ed, Abbie, Izzy, and I went to the fair. Bec stayed home because Dave decided to grace us with his presence, and they watched Heroes and ate steak and corn on the cob for dinner. When we got to the fair, we were a bit disappointed because the animals were all gone. We went into every barn and only saw a few calves and steers. Our adult disappointment didn’t stop Izzy from jumping up and down in her stroller—as best she could with her little seatbelt on—and laughingly chanting, “Diddle, diddle, diddle.” Pretty sweet. We played games, and Ed won tons of little animals for Iz. Abbie won a little purple whale, which I must say was cute, and I didn’t win jack. I have never been able to play Carnival games.

Our favorite part of the fair by far was the food. I know, everything’s food! I got fried mushrooms that were huge and tasty, Ed had the biggest turkey leg I’ve ever seen, and Abs had the biggest corn dog in the world. The gluttony was fair-time magical. I also had a great lemon shake-up and some pretty good cotton candy. All-in-all I would say it was a positive experience.
The one draw back was that my two good friends seem to place wagers on whether or not I will see people I know. Apparently, that is quite a sport among my friends, including Becky. I can’t say that I blame them, since I DO see people I know absolutely everywhere. It DOES border on ridiculousness.

Finally, I came to the stark realization today that there are only 5 weeks until school starts. I haven’t written my syllabus, I haven’t finished the books I wanted to finish, I haven’t ordered my books for fall, and I haven’t taken a break. Literally, there are five more weekends before the first Monday of school. Good thing for Florida. The prospect of going back to school so soon is sad but exciting, because this is my last year of classes. I am a bit nervous about comps and that pesky dissertation, but I think I can, as Bob says, “Saw through it.”

But it seems like they were never gone. Weird isn’t it how even though people you love leave, when they come back, it seems like they were never gone. We spent both Friday and Saturday night with Ed and Abbie, and I swear it was as if we had just spent the weekend before with them, too. Izzy is absolutely precious, and I think I may frequently borrow her when she is older. It’ll be sort of like having a child without having to have one, which is a plus. We played Apples to Apples, which always reminds me of New Year’s Eve, but we had a great time, and of course, Becky “I don’t like to play games” Kaehr won by a landslide. Sometimes that woman!

Celie, the puppy, is getting big. Since everyone keeps asking me about her, I will fill you in. She weighs about 35 pounds and is in that puppy-rambunctious phase, the one tests your love as a puppy parent. She chews. She poops. She chews. She eats. She chews. She sleeps. She chews. She rocket launches herself across the room. She chews. Did I mention that she chews? She does: on us, on her toys, on things we didn’t even know we owned, and on her siblings. The vet said she is getting her big girl teeth, so she will be especially chewy for the next couple of months. My hands are proof.

I leave next week for Florida. I am riding the motorcycle down to Atlanta on Tuesday then staying in a hotel just north of the city, so I can get up at the crack of dawn to beat the rush hour traffic around the city. I plan to make it to Merideth’s early on Wednesday, so I can be there when she gets home from work. I need to make sure I have directions to her new house, though, so I don’t show up at Leah’s. On the way home the next weekend, I am going to ride to the south side of Chattanooga, so that my last day riding is only about a six hour trip. I have to get home to rest up to go to Jimmy Buffett on the 29th with Adam.

In other good news, we are going to the Delaware Country Fair with Ed, Abs, and Izard on Friday. I hope to eat some good corn-on-the-cob, since apparently it is my favorite food group, and to watch Iz having fun looking at all the diddles. Oh, yeah, and hanging out with Ed and Abbie will be great, too! 🙂

This weekend is my cousin’s wedding. So Saturday will be spent with family—extended family. Ever seen my big, fat, Greek wedding? It’s like that only not humorous. I will get to see my grandma, though, and I almost never see her because she lives in Huntington now, and I don’t get up there much. I am going to go before the summer is over and classes start back up, though. Sunday will be fun because we are going to go out for dinner to celebrate my birthday. I will be 34. I had such great plans for 24. I pushed them back to 34. Now, I guess I will have to push them back again to 44. Hopefully, by then I can run that marathon, have a real job, and have my house remodeled and looking somewhat decent.

Onward.

As we were walking the dogs tonight, it struck me that I totally forgot to take Celie to her vet appointment this evening, so I rescheduled it for 9 o’clock tomorrow morning. She needs her last puppy shot! I’m sure she will love me for taking her first thing in the morning. Right now she is a little destruction machine; she’s at that phase in a puppy’s life when God keeps reminding us how cute she is so we won’t kill her. She tore some of the insulation out of one of the walls of the garage, so we had to put a board up in order to keep her from chewing more of it. It sounds worse than it is, because our walls aren’t finished in the garage, so it’s not like she chewed through drywall or anything, she just pulled the insulation off from the wall. And then ate some. And then pooped some.

This morning when I got ready to go out for my morning jog, I went to the kitchen to get my watch and my iPod, but my watch was no where to be found. I assumed that one of the cats had just knocked it onto the floor or something, so I looked around for it a bit. I then thought that maybe Bec had moved it or something, so I called her to see if she had seen it. She HAD seen it, but the now missing watch was in the same place it had been the night before when I had seen it. I could only come to one conclusion: the cats hid it from me. After looking high and low, on top of book shelves, under the couches, between their cushions, and everywhere else imaginable, I had to admit that the cats are better at hide-and-seek than I am!