About a week ago, I find myself after class (as usual) at the Stoneyard Lounge in Brockport, NY for a drink with fellow grad students. There's a guy with a Trek jacket on and we start talking bikes and he says he's worked in a bike shop for most of his life, manages tours, has been on tour and is now thinking of building-
"Wait," I say, "you tour?"
"Yeah, man," he says, and he tells me about his own tour: http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/3113
"I did the TransAm a few years ago," I say.
He puts his beer down he looks at me somewhat intensely and his eyes wince a little and he says, "Oh. So you get it."
I'm just chiming in here because something happened at that exact moment when we realized we were connected through bike touring. We spoke of the philosophy tourers adopt and adapt to with being on the road, being in the moment, just being in the "now" of life and the adventure it brings. The conversation got pretty meta and a little nostalgic for me but I'll just relay one quick story I remember Chris telling me about how bike touring has made a difference how HE views the world.
So Chris is opening the bike shop in Brockport on a Friday in the late 80's. It's 9 a.m., he's pouring his cup of coffee about to get the store in order when he hears, on the front door, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM on the window. He opens the door and there's a stout man, beard down to his stomach, thick glasses cracked and dirty, and his clothes have obviously been worn for multiple days or weeks.
"Can I help you?" Chris asks.
"Are you Chris?" the guy asks.
"Yeah."
"The Preacher sent me," the guy says.
"What?" Chris assumes this guy is crazy.
"The Preacher," the guy says again, pointing down the road, "he said you could help me."
"I'll do my best, man," Chris says, "but what is it I can-" and that's when Chris sees the bike. It's a ragged little Huffy. The pedals on it are broken, the teeth on the chain ring don't exist anymore and there's four feet of stuff, blankets, clothes, water jugs, pots, hats, all piled on about three feet high on the rear rack.
Chris takes the bike in the shop and basically determines it is theoretically impossible this guy could be riding this disaster of a bike. There aren't even any ball bearings left. Chris asks where the guys riding from.
"Alaska," the guy says.
"You rode here from Alaska??" Chris asks. But the man answers no, that he rode down the West coast, through Texas, to Florida, up to Vermont and is riding back to Alaska. On a single gear Huffy bike with no teeth left on the chain ring.
In telling the story, Chris said that from that day on he realized that no matter how hard something is, how shitty everything can become and how terrible things might happen to turn out...you have to remember to not give up. To push, to survive. To try.
Bike touring reminds us how to live.
Chris fixed the bike for free while the the guy danced around to The Grateful Dead playing on the radio sitting on the counter.
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