We've had so many great bike rides these past few weeks, that it's hard to imagine why I ever sold my racing bike. I've even unearthed my old biking shorts--the ones with the padded crotch--and though the padding has worn thin, a few holes have sprung in the buttocks, and the belly is stretched out enough to fit a woman four times as wide as me, they remind me of taking to the roads in Williamstown twenty some years ago, when I rode the surrounding hills in the same shorts and learned the joys and hazards of riding in a pack, and sometimes alone, without a helmet or dark glasses. Nowadays, I wouldn't dare go riding without glasses or a helmet; after all, not only do I have a responsibility to model good habits for my children, but I have as well as a much clearer sense of my own mortality. I dropped the invincibility thing a long time ago. Sometime after giving up the Iron Lungs m.o. and before becoming a mom. Been there, done that.
The boys and I take to the roads to relax, take in the charms of the day, calm our nerves, and reset our sense of calm. The surrounding hills are beautiful this time of year, with lush shades of green set out like a banquet. Splashes of colorful wildflowers erupt here and there, and along the roadsides, daisies bend their broad petaled faces toward the sun on spindly necks and wobbly knees. Strawberry season has arrived; and if we don't drop everything to pick our fill, we'll miss out on the incredible taste of summer. We'd ride our bikes, but returning home with a cache of strawberries might be too dangerous an enterprise. Quite happily, just a few doors down from us sits Upinngil, a lovely farm that grows bodacious IPM and organic strawberries, in addition to its incredible array of fresh raw, organic milk and cheese, honey, maple syrup, vegetables, and eggs, which we get hand-delivered by Malcolm, our trusty Egg Boy. Two mornings this week already, we have filled our box with piles of huge, red fruit warmed and ripened by the week's intense sun, taking care to save more than they we eat. We have emptied our final bag of frozen strawberries from last season; it is time to fill the freezer again for wintertime smoothies that melt away the iciness of the dark, cold season, when it's easy to forget why we ever wanted to live here in the first place.
But these late spring, early summer days, there's not much I would trade about living here. There's much that is expected--the early morning birdsongs that seem to repeat over and over until I am up, with the sun, to greet the long stretch of day and try to make no plans whatsoever; the near-evanescence of the strawberry season, rivaling that of sugaring time, when the sap buckets bang against the maples on blustery late winter afternoons and the steam rises from the small sugar houses that dot the landscape; the promise of bounty that radiates from the nascent vegetable garden, with everything growing overnight, in the crepuscular cool and midday heat; and the long stretches of meadow and lake and river and country road that beckon us, to take up paddles, lace up boots and climb on saddles, to ride the back roads and hike the less traveled trails, to see a different Gill from the one we grow weary of during winter's lock-in. And then there's the unexpected--the arrival of a large painted turtle in the garden one evening at dusk, a sudden splashing in the back pond, the skeow of the green herons, the discovery of a new swimming hole. My sense of wonder is in tact, and for that, I am grateful.
One day, we take the long loop around town and end up at the Wagon Wheel, a jaunty little drive-through on Rou
te 2 that serves up tasty grass-fed burgers and curly fries (if you eat that kind of thing) alongside falafal, local greens salads with warm herb-crusted goat cheese, and mouth watering paninis. I buy the boys ice creams and a large honey iced herb tea for myself, and we sit and catch our breath and make sure the ice creams don't melt and drip before our tongues have tasted every last bit. Bellies somewhat full, we power our way up three giant hills, then down, down, down some fast stretches of road past the farms and cows that eye u
s suspiciously as we call out to them, "Hello, girls!"I am well aware that my own girls do quite well on bike rides, that there is no soreness or tightness that interferes with my comfort on the ride, that my sports bra, while not disguising my asymmetry all that well, does a good job at supporting my ever-growing girl-in-progress, and that I feel fairly normal (mind you, I've never felt completely normal, and I see that as a good thing) while spinning my wheels around town. (this would contrast what I feel like when I try to run, even a few steps, to catch a giant frisbee, say, or lay a tag on one of the boys during a game of Pickle, and my left side aches and begs for me to stop, and I feel like an absolute freak.)
Girls aside, or maybe because of my girls, it feels great to be riding again, though it is somewhat bittersweet, since in just few days, I'll have to give it up for another month. I'm happy to know that it'll be there, waiting for me, when I'm ready to dive back in. And maybe, just maybe, I'll spring for a new pair of padded bicycle shorts, ones that actually cushion the crotch and don't show off my pink panties to the world.
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