ONE

I am but one. One among many. So, here’s my thought: I enjoy travel. I like adventure and arguably come from a very adventurous family. My Mom is a world traveler and has been to close to fifty different nations. My Dad has been to several with her and always enjoys exploring the wilderness with loved ones. My sister has traveled criss-cross around the country and has also done a fair amount of traveling and missions work in other nations. My brother has traveled in Eastern Europe and road tripped through Central America. He is currently enrolled in a 2-year mountain guide school that has taken him from Alaska to Patagonia to Spain and back again. With all these travels comes many experiences and meeting new people, eating new foods and doing new activities in amazing and not-so amazing settings. So, in a word: adventure. Therefore, it is not by mistake that I would pick up the same adventure gene and want the same for my life. The same ‘ole thing gets kind of boring and the world beckons for attention.

I am but one. There is one of me on this Perfect Circles odyssey next summer. Granted, I do have a support guy that is in as well. And for that I am very grateful and welcome him and his wife with open arms as they did to me a few years ago. However, for the sake of argument, there is one going on this trip. I have clumped me and my friend into the “one.” I have made the route publicly known and have sent out advertisements for companions. I have invited anyone who wants to come along for any leg of the journey. I have had a few minor interests, but nothing definite. I know everyone has their lives and not many people can just take a summer and leave, but no one even has expressed so much as a “awe man, I wish I could go.” I have tried to gain supporters and raise any funds for said trip that would’ve been a support raising journey for the start of a camp or a bicycle trip ministry, but within the past year I have had zero interest. I am not saying I don’t have support. I do. I have people who believe in me and support my decisions. But beyond that (save from my family) I have had zero interest. I ran into the same obstacle with my dream to start a Christian camp ministry. In my journey I have discovered that no one is willing to “get their hands dirty” but many are willing to “support me.” I don’t really know what “support” means to a lot of people, but it seems to me that they use that word all to frequently and it has lost some of its meaning.

I ask, “Where have all my good friends gone to?” I was thinking just the other day that if a friend of mine was in my position asking for companions or whatnot, I would have been all over that. If nothing else, I would be excited for them. This is not a complaint blog. It is more of an observance blog. With four months to go until departure day, I can’t help but notice and observe the lack of support. This trip, I hope, goes hand-in-hand with my dream of staring a camp. “Perfect Circles” is not just a name I devised for this 2014 trip, it is the name of a hopeful future bicycle adventure ministry. This trip, I have made it known will hopefully be the first in many trips and adventures (with differing locations) in a series of “Perfect Circles” journeys that will, God-willing reflect research and support-raising for a future in Christian camping that may first take form as a bicycle adventure ministry for youth and adults.

Here’s to hoping a future blog will claim two or three or thirty-four.

I do thank all of you have expressed some form of support for me and my trip. Gratitude goes out to. But for now…keep the wheels rolling and the sending the prayer upwards. I will update more as “Perfect Circles” is formed and I talk to my present comrade-in-arms. Peace to you.

Weather or not, here I come

In just four short months I will embark on a journey of a lifetime (which itself will hopefully be the first in a series of “Perfect Circles” journeys). In a way it seems surreal, especially when I don’t feel ready. Part of me wants to plan and likes to plan, but another part of me says, “just skip the planning and GO.” I have read up on many adventurers and their treks and recently I came upon one guy who basically chose not to prepare at all, well at least prepare in the “this is where I’m going” aspect. He took his bike, tent, and toothbrush and headed out to get lost on the open road to cycle around the world. It just so happens fate had other plans and he met a girl enroute and fell in love. But isn’t that the essence of adventurous travel? That is what separates travel from adventurous travel I suppose. Whatever happens in four months, I will be on an adventure. This does comfort me some to know that whatever purchases I may need or whatever planning I think necessary, the “Go factor” is what matters and the open road is what beckons and looms over the rest.

                                   

I would be lying if I said I had no worries. Worry beckons whenever I get dizzy from inactivity or I feel sick from cycling across town. Worry makes itself present when my legs fail to carry me up a mild city hill or when my core feels weak or when my bike acts up and I need to get it looked at. In a Bible study a few weeks ago I looked at the Do Not Worry passage in the Gospel of Luke. That passage is so relevant and yet so easy to look past and ignore. What do I have to worry about? God will protect me and provide for me as He has protected and provides for the sparrows and lilies. But alas, it is much easier to say or write such things than it is to put into practice. After all, God has provided this adventure and laid a dream in my lap…so why wouldn’t He keep me safe on such a voyage? It will be an incredible feeling once I get a few weeks down the road and learn to keep my wits about me and have a sense of “this is actually happening!”

So I say to you, “Weather or Not, Here I Come.” (Now, before you English fanatics get excited, no I did not misuse the word ‘weather’ when I should’ve used ‘whether,’ nor did I unintentionally replace ‘ready or not’ with ‘weather or not.’) ‘Weather or not, here I come’ refers not only to the physical elements that surround us out-of-doors, but also to any physical bodily weather or preparation weather. Where do you think they get the term, “Under the weather?” I pray that I will cycle above the weather and gouge out any eye of any storm that I may encounter. I pray that I will fear no evil or thief or trucker or hill that I will encounter. Whether there is weather or not (and there will be, so the “or not” is obsolete) I will ride my mechanical horse down the Pacific Coast of the US of A and God-willing, back up through the Mojave Desert and Sierra Nevada Mountains. Weather will try to haunt me all the way along and will be my constant companion but I must embrace it like a brother. Although I do ask for your prayer, even though it is four months away, I ask for prayer for final preparations and also during the trip itself. The weather will find me. I pray that it won’t find me unawares. This is becoming real. This is actually going to happen. What have I gotten myself into? Well, the answer is: adventure.

Weather or not, here I come…

Reflections on a week with no riding + My proposed route

Well well, it's been awhile. I thought I ought to return with a blog before you thought I was backing out of this endeavor of mine. I must assure you that it is still on. Some may think I am a bit crazy for doing such a thing in such short a time, but if I knew I would succeed in this, it would be too easy. The super bowl is playing on the tube in the background, but seeing that I am not much of a football fan, I thought I'd pen a blog instead. The game may be  more interesting if the players were all riding bikes or shooting arrows, but I digress. Although...I do enjoy the commercials and trailers. I just got chills up my spine when I saw the new Transformers movie. Maybe I'll get to see it on my trip.

Last Monday on the way to my ASL class, my rear tire blew causing me to walk the rest of the way. Since my tire-changing expertise is lacking, especially when it involves my rear tube, I needed to take it in to a bike shop. A few lazy days later, I finally did. However, needless to say, I went without riding a bike for the longest time since September. It's been a week since I've felt the wind at my back (or front) and experienced the challenge of traveling up a hill. I have had to take that wretched form of transportation called a car. Ironically, the less I drive, the more I dislike driving. That should be backwards. But alas, my tire is fixed and God-willing I should be back on two wheels tomorrow for my morning commute.

Simply put: driving is lame. Stuck in traffic, stop and go, impatient honkers, expensive fuel prices and insurance...it does get you places faster, I'll give you that....only sometimes though, sometimes a bike is faster. But the heater in the auto succumbs you to comfort so easily. I'm sure, even being gone a week, it will still take a little bit of time to get used to riding again...to be in the elements, the cold, the heat, the wind, the hills, the freedom. I have given some thought, not seriously min you, that when my car's life comes to an end, I should take note of my transportation needs and perhaps just forget about getting a new car...and make cycle-commuting my life...but only time will tell on that one.

I did recently get some panniers for my bike and am still figuring them out...things are coming together! In the coming weeks I will talk to my support guy (who is currently on a mission to Mexico) about some specifics and share with him my proposed route for the trip in which I attached here. I hope you enjoy it. If you or someone you know lives along my route and would like to accommodate me, please let me know...that would be so great!! Or, if you see a leg of the journey in which you would like to travel with me, either by bike or auto, that's cool too. I'd love the company! But for now, I'm out. Take care and enjoy your own adventures.