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I am the Ponderer!

Do you remember that song, “I Am the Wanderer”? It was from the Sixties or so, it goes on about a guy that feels the need to wander whenever he gets too close to someone. Well, I don’t have the exact same problem, although I do feel I have the soul of a traveler, no I need to wander just not when I get too close to someone.

I need to wander; I need to see what is around the bend for I am always imagining what is there. I imagine what it would be like to visit this place and see that area; I imagine all the interesting and wonderful people I will meet, even the homeless ones that other people would rather walk over than talk to. For it is those experiences that I treasure.
I grew up reading quite a bit, I was an only child to a flight attendant; I had a father growing up but he died when I was but eleven years old. Needless to say I was alone quite a bit. For me, though, it really wasn’t that bad. I had friends but I also had my imagination, stories and my bicycle to get me through it. It was with these things that I could go anywhere! Not only would I ride my bike ten miles across town but I would journey across the country or the globe, imagining the stories that I would eventually make for myself.

This has carried on all the way to where I am now, I still have more passion for my bicycle than is probably healthy and my imagination has yet to slow down even a bit. What has changed though is instead of me dreaming up a trip where I am riding a horse across the plain in search of that lost cow I am now seeing myself cycling through the high mountains on my way to the coast. You see it’s still there, it has simply evolved.

When I was about Sixteen years old I knew this older man who I would go on rides with; he was an awesome guy if not a bit odd, but engineers often are different than the rest of us. He, however, is one of the people responsible for getting me hooked on bike racing, he would tell me stories of him back in the day racing on the track, putting it all out there on the line to the point where you have to KNOW that you will win, otherwise you are simply the first loser.
One time we were at a race and we were rolling around, warming up, and discussing the agenda for the race. I started to look at different situations objectively, weighing the pros and cons of doing this rather than that when all of a sudden he broke my train of thought with an exclamation. “Zac,” he said, “You think too much, stop thinking. In a race you must learn to not think, just do. If you over think a situation you will miss the opportunity to take the win.”
This sage advice, from an old Jewish engineer from Rochester New York, has stuck with me to this day.

Still, I have a tendency to over think things; I try to listen to what my heart tells me but I always have this fear that I will make the wrong choice. What if I make this decision and down the road the latter choice was best? Ugh! Sometimes, it simply destroys me.
This is why this blog is called The Ponderer’s Musings and I am called The Pondering Guey, for I am the Pondering Fool, I think till all the choices are gone.

Now, my heart is strong and gets stronger everyday for everyday I learn to listen to its inherent knowledge more and more.

If I can simply learn to balance the two I will be perfect, no?
Now go out into the world dear readers and do what the song says, Listen to Your Heart!

Life Ride

Yesterday I rode out to the other side of town to join a group ride, which is always something I look forward to, with the intention of riding for at least 100 miles. In cycling circles riding a hundred miles is called a Century, like a century is a hundred years. And doing this is considered a turning point in every cyclist’s life.
Riding a century requires a good deal of preparation; it requires a great amount of food, both before the ride, during and especially after; it requires you to be rested; but, it also requires you to have the determination to do it, to keep going even when you are at mile 60 or 70 and are starting to feel your muscles become tired.
Determination is a thing that is required to do anything in life, unfortunately a good deal of people lack it. I know this because I see it in people, and I am able to see it because I too lack determination.
Does this relegate us to never succeeding in life? No! In fact I believe this puts us at an advantage for we know and understand our shortcomings and can then overcome them and be better because of it.
This ride that we are all on, Life, is just like a Century! There are times when you want to give up or you think you can’t go on, but you simply must keep going. If you come to a rise and it is suddenly too difficult you can look at this “hill” as a negative, something to be feared or you can take it as something that will make you stronger.
There is an organized Century ride that happens here in Texas every August, and it is arguably one of the most popular Century rides in the Nation and it annually attracts tens of thousands of people. I, however, have never been attracted to it. Why? I feel it’s too boring, perhaps even too easy! It is completely flat! Why would someone want that?
It’s just like my distaste for an “ordinary” and uneventful life. It might be easier and you might live longer but what monotony! Where is the challenge of the hill-climb or the thirty five mile an hour wind that is blowing straight at you? If there is no challenge then you will never be as strong as you truly could be.

Training Plan

I think the thing I love so much about the bicycle is the fact that it is at time so solitary. Even when you are with other people you are still alone; alone with your pain, suffering or joy. This is not to say that others are not feeling the same thing, though, because usually they are. Look at a group of cyclists going up a hill, they are all in pain but each of them hides it from the other as much as they can. People, from my experiences, don’t want to show others when they are struggling, they might break down and do so but they will wait as long as possible.

Like a bike ride, life and our interconnectivity with others is all about what we decide to show. Do you want to lay it all out on the table or do you want to keep some in?

Do you even want to ride with people? It has been said that you can get the most targeted training when you are alone and so it is with others. If you feel that there are things that are lacking maybe it would be best to get out there and do some of those lonely miles. It might be best to raise your personal bar back up before you set out to hang with the group again.

Isn't it all about the journey?

It has been said, often and by many, that life is all about the journey rather than the destination. But, is it?

The thought of a final destination is something that keeps most people heading in the right direction. They need the goal of a family to support or a woman to impress or simply the fact that they want to be able to do whatever it is they want to drive them forward. That is perfectly fine, I am quite a goal oriented person myself, but this can not take precedence over self can it?

What is "self"? That is simply what I call anything that you do simply for the joy of doing it. Stopping to look at the bird or eating your lunch by the fountain instead of inside the building.

There are those of us, however, that need to do a little bit more. Perhaps they feel the need to go outside their box, the community that they are surrounded by. Or perhaps it is a need to step out of the comfort zone, get a sweat and feel a bit of adrenaline. Whatever, it's all the same.

You see, both the person that is sitting under the tree daydreaming of becoming a squirrel and the guy that feels the need to ride his bicycle across the country are essentially the same person doing the same thing for the same reason.

So go pleasure yourself! Find something to do that is just for you, to either submerse yourself in thought or lose it all together. :)

What am I listening to?

For why cannot I have the life which I desire, all I need is a plan and the desire to accomplish it. This is the mindset which I follow, always positive and thinking in the now/future sense. With planning and drive coupled with intelligence and the knowing that you can do “it”, anything is within your grasp.

I feel that bicycle commuting can not only do the obvious of helping the environment, reducing the carbon footprint, agitating the ‘straights’” but it can also be a therapeutic outlet. It amazes me how often I can be stressed out from work or school or not be quite awake enough in the morning and then I’ll get on the bike and run an errand or come home and it’ll magically work itself out. Remember that cycling is an incredible endurance sport and can unlock hidden fat cells and thereby toxins which can unleash a wave of pleasure inducing chemicals, all of which are nice to have in the blood stream before a long day at work!

...

"who the fuck knows man who cares its for right now either take advantage of the situation or move the fuck out of the way such is life"

~Random Muttering