Out And About Again
I woke up today with absolutely nothing to do on my calendar. That should be a good thing, but I am programmed to think that I should always have an agenda for the day, so its a little off-putting. Kim’s cabaret friend, Lenny, is here for a week of vacation and they are planning to go to his favorite San Diego attraction, which for some inexplicable reason is Old Town. I have nothing against Old Town as it is a perfectly nice historic early settler site with a small town quake’s worth of buildings and western planked sidewalks. You can get a daguerreotype photograph there and you can shop at an old tin smith’s shop, so it is all reminiscent of what San Diego was like 200 years ago. Of course, in those days San Diego was mostly about God and agriculture, but that’s too hard to capture in a tourist venue other than having a simple adobe church with old wooden pews to wander through. The real facts of early mission life with the priests and monks imposing their religious view of the world on the poor and needy indigenous population that was still getting used to these aggressive white men with their thunder sticks, are not things to proudly display. Therefore, having been to Old Town more times than I can shake a thunder stick at, and having eaten more Casa de Reyes fajitas than I care to, I have chosen to leave them to that attraction while I find something else to do.
It is a mild 70 degrees out and scheduled to get up into the mid 80s today. It looks clear and sunny. You probably know where this is headed. I have decided that since I don’t have any work to do and the garden in mid-summer looks about how it should, I should get on my motorcycle and take a trip to the mountains and high desert east of here. I don’t really have a specific destination, but there is plenty to do and see and the real purpose is twofold. First, since I will be going on a week-long motorcycle trip in the Maritime Provinces next month, I should probably get my motorcycle legs back on for a bit. A day’s ride to reestablish all the old muscle memory should help when I am on slippery leaf-covered roads on the Cabot Trail in Nova Scotia. The second reason is just to get out and about. Like the occasional roadtrip, it is important to the full appreciation of what I have on this lovely hilltop to leave it once in while to see what’s going on in the outside world, to interact with people I don’t know and to remind myself that there is, indeed, more to the world than just this little hilltop.
Kim made some blueberry scones yesterday and I am having two for breakfast along with a recent discovery, a Cactus Cooler, an orange pineapple “blast” soda that we discovered on our recent roadtrip. Buddy is hanging around with me on the sofa, showing lots of interest in my scones. I give him a few pieces of scone with the occasional blueberry (which he likes) and at one point he takes the piece, but then sets it aside rather than eat it. Buddy is like all of us, he wants his scone and yet he wants to eat it too. He will go to the far side of the leather sofa and put the piece I have given him down without eating it. I know he likes it because I have seen him eat several other pieces and he is also back for his next piece even though he has not eaten the last one. If he gets distracted by Kim making him his regular breakfast, he always keeps one eye on that piece he left at the far end of the sofa. If I so much as twitch in that direction, he will jump up on the sofa to position himself between me and the piece, jealously guarding what is his. I have no doubt that if I chose to try to grab the piece in order to tidy up the sofa and keep Kim from discovering our food larceny (I am not supposed to feed Buddy people food), I would be in a fight to the death with him over that little tidbit that I broke off of the scone while I was eating it. You see, Buddy has his breakfast of chicken and cheese and all the things he likes, siting on the kitchen floor waiting for him, but he would rather protect that silly piece of slightly salivated scone.
So this morning I will leave my beloved hilltop with its lovely gardens and all my other toys and comforts, and I will get on a motorcycle that is nowhere near as comfortable as my truck and I will ride out into the unknown. Most hot summer days I have on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. Today I have long pants and socks as well as a long sleeve t-shirt to keep my forearms from frying. It is a much less comfortable kit for a hot summer’s day, but it is the least one should wear to keep some distance between your skin and the asphalt should the two come into unexpected contact. I know I will find the ride exhilarating and that the rush will be good for me, but I do find myself sitting here wondering what I am thinking leaving the air conditioned comfort of my house and ease of my shorts and t-shirt in favor of girding my loins for a motorcycle ride in the heat of a San Diego summer. I guess I want my scone and I want to eat it too. I want to keep tasting life out on the road in addition to having the respite of my hilltop to return to and appreciate for all its comforts and familiarity.
As soon as I finish this story, I will go out and check my tire pressure and mount my BMW R1250 GS Adventure to go out and find a half day of adventure to go with its name. I will not ride off-road or anything crazy like that (though the bike is built for that), and I will be my normal cautious self and keep the rubber side down even as I sweep a few turns faster than I should. It will all feel very familiar to me since I have been doing this for 56 years now and yet it will feel as new as the morning air because its been a while since I rode outside my neighborhood. Why is going out and about so important to my mental health. I guess it is because it does remind me of my passions of youth and my years of honing my riding skills all at once. It tells me that the world is a beautiful place and that our natural wonders in this great country of ours are limitless. Everything I get from a roadtrip I get with a day ride on my motorcycle plus I get the added bonus of the discomfort of leaving my cocoon for a bit and remembering that life has a harder and more exotic side than I will ever be able to or want to recreate on my hilltop. There is nothing special about going out and about again except that without doing it, life is just a little more boring.