The Dirt Field

Hello there. It’s been a few days, a lot has happened, a lot of it has been a crapload of suck, so let’s get caught up and back on track with the whole regular posting thing.

Kelley Acres Race Report
I was going to do a full report on this event, but I procrastinated and then Grandma died, so it went by the wayside. To summarize, I spent the days before this race feeling dread and doom yet again. The Saturday night before, I even broke from my standard pre-race teetotaling and had a beer, and then ate my feelings in the form of fifteen Nutter Butter wafer cookies and three servings of candy corn. It was ugly. The morning of the race was spent agonizing over whether or not to go (including a sobfest in the car after arriving at the venue and registering), until I finally decided I would hate myself more if I backed out at the last minute.

I did a quick warm-up on the trainer while dancing to music that I refuse to admit is on my iPod, lined up in my second row starting position, and promptly blew the start. No idea what happened; one minute I’m pedaling hard and the next minute girls are flying past me. All of the dread and depressing feelings flooded back in and I quickly slid to the back of the pack and considered dropping out, but then realized the only thing worse than quitting after registering would be quitting after slipping to dead last. I picked it up at that point (I may be shortchanged on the mental fortitude, but I can ride hard when forced), played back-and-forth with some of the women grouped behind the top three, and then pulled off a strong fourth place in the 1/2/3 Elite Women and first place out of the Cat 3 Women.

Grandma
The viewing/wake was this past Monday evening, and after arriving and greeting my family, I went to see Grandma lying in her open casket. It was weird; she looked like herself but she also didn’t and because I am completely immature, I touched her hand to see how it felt. It was icy and firm, nothing like the warm softness it had been a few weeks earlier, and I decided then that my grandma was not there in that odd-smelling box.

The funeral mass was the next morning and I was scheduled to give a speech as a result of an impulsive act of volunteering the previous Thursday. Most of the ceremony was spent wiping the pooling sweat off my palms and onto my suit, until the part after communion when it was time for me to speak. It went well, despite my nerves. Then my father spoke, the mass ended, we joined the funeral procession to the cemetery (and ran roughly every red light in Maryland), and fifteen minutes later, the whole thing was done and that was the end of the road for Grandma. It was also the end of the road for my car’s front tire, which died on the way to the funeral reception.

Now I am back at work, wrapped up in everyday life, and it feels almost normal except when I remember that my grandmother no longer exists. I can’t quite wrap my head around that part. I did not cry at the funeral; instead, I am holding out for a more appropriate time to feel the full force of the loss, like say during a meeting or in the grocery store. One thing that helps is that I’ve reinvented a small part of my largely non-existent religious beliefs to now include a place for my grandma that is in a heaven of her very own, hanging out with my grandpa and the other people she loved in her life. It makes me feel better than to think that she just winked out, leaving that cold body in the box. I also like to imagine that she is sort of around all the time, which is comforting when I think about her being there in spirit during my next race, but less comforting when I think about her being there the day after I’ve had Chipotle for dinner.

The Log Posse Does Seven Springs
Back in July, I started a post about a trip with the Log Posse, but I never got around to finishing that post. Here it is:

July 2009: This past weekend, we joined the Log Posse at a cabin in Pennsylvania for a weekend of riding. This included a visit on Sunday to Seven Springs Ski Resort, where Bobby and I rented bikes to try true downhill biking for the first time. Sunday started a little too early after not quite enough sleep, but somehow the six of us all ate breakfast (including me, with my scientifically prepared, highly regimented meal), got ready, and made it out the door in one hour, using only one small kitchen and one bathroom. Do you realize how amazing that is, that six adults shared one bathroom, left the house on time, and didn’t have to kill each other or resort to pooping in the woods? I suppose we may have left roughly ten minutes late, which to some people (ARNE) probably felt like an eternity, but to me it felt like we were early and had time to bake muffins or polish the windowpanes.

We drove to Seven Springs, rented bikes, bought our lift tickets, and rode up the mountain for the first run of the day. The big debate was whether or not the chairlift would be scary for those of us less fond of heights, and at first it was a bit unnerving. The ground drops away fast and the chair feels pretty minimal, but after a minute or so, Bobby and I switched to playing If You Had To Jump Off This Chair, At What Point Would You Do It?

The first run of the day sucked. I was nervous, the rental bike felt awkward and unfamiliar, I couldn’t keep my feet on the platform pedals, and I was too scared to let go of the brakes. It was also cold and windy on top of the mountain, and I started wondering if this was just a bad idea and should instead spend the day in the resort’s bike shop, buying Fox merchandise with money I didn’t have. Six more runs later, I was bombing down the mountain, whooping on the especially fun parts, and refusing to sit out any rides. The only thing bothering me by then was my hands, which refused to unclench from the deathgrip I had on the handlebar at the end of each run.

After a lunch in the resort’s employee cafeteria (a lunch that took me five years longer than anyone else to eat because apparently I am a digestive sloth), we all headed back out to the slopes to ride. The rest of the afternoon was spent going up and down the mountain as fast as possible, while working on letting go of the brakes and learning to get air on the tabletop jumps. The whole experience was so much fun and really helped me relax on downhills, which has been one of my big weaknesses during races. I didn’t even mind dangling my 40+ pound bike off the chairlift, except for the time it was sliding off my lap slightly as I announced to Bobby, “This will be fine as long as the chairlift doesn’t stop.” The moment the words left my mouth, the lift halted.

At one point, while about halfway down the mountain, I felt something weird happen with my bike and my foot flew off the pedal. Not knowing what had happened, I kept going and was only slightly bothered by a weird sound. Our group stopped a minute later to take a new trail down a different run, at which point I noticed and remarked that my derailleur cable had gotten caught in and chewed by the cassette. I was so wrapped up in the drama of that minor problem that it took Mike saying, “Um, where’s your chain?” for me to notice that my chain had fallen off. A while ago.

And that’s as far as I got. The reason I’m sticking that in here now is because the Posse went back up to Seven Springs this past weekend. Bobby and I changed our plans a bit after the events with my family, but were fortunately able to get in some quality time with the group and spend a whole day downhilling. Details will probably follow later, but I wanted to at least mention this in my update, since everything else here is somewhat dark and gloomy.

What? You Said Dark and Gloomy?
Since my grandma died last Thursday, there have been a lot of moments that have had me ready to throw my hands in the air while screaming WHY?!? I was shamed by a Genius at the Apple store who “fixed” my non-broken iPod with a touch of technical expertise and a huge helping of smugness. I smashed my head on the door of the bathroom not once, not twice, but three times in a hugely painful, shriek-and-tear-up way. Scoot scratched his eye and has spent the last three days curled up in a miserable ball, licking his paw and squinting at us in a sad, pathetic, probably expensive to fix way. My car tire came apart after the burial and has been a nightmare to replace for reasons that include a misquote from Sears, a lack of credit card acceptance by Costco, a delusion on the part of NTB that tires should cost my life savings, and an expired state inspection on the car I’m borrowing while I wait for a new set of tires to grow organically on my car. My father’s car died the day of the viewing in the parking lot of the funeral home (oh, the irony). And I made it almost all the way to work yesterday before realizing I’d forgotten my laptop at home. After going back to get it, I actually made it out to the parking lot before realizing that I’d forgotten it again. Right now it feels like the fun will never stop.

But This Too Shall Pass
Flat tires, death, sick dogs, and good friends are all part of life, so I guess I need to just keep moving forward and wait for the unhappy times to pass. There are some lights at the end of this tunnel – I’m racing the B Men’s category at Granogue this weekend, which should be interesting,  and also getting ready for Halloween and my 25th birthday. Onward and upward…I hope.