oh, right, my blog...

my mom told me i need to update my blog. its been a while, hasn’t it? i’ve crossed 4 state lines and a time zone.

its certainly not that i dont have plenty to say, i write the most brilliant, emotionally touching, witty posts ever, while i’m riding. silently, to myself.
really, i do.

these rarely make it into my tiny little computer…and then when i have the time (and free hands) to do it, somehow the words aren’t ready, it seems i’ve left them miles behind, put new and different words on top of them. jumblethoughts. nobodywantstohearthisstuffthoughts. imtootiredtothinkthoughts.
istruggletoarticulatemyselfthoughts
and the longer i wait, the more things that pass, the more daunting the task

fine.

instead of speeding up this parade, a necessary plan if we were to make it home in the assumed amount of time, we’ve slloowwwedd dooowwnnnnn…
theres been rain. theres been short days, late start days, the days are getting shorter and we lost an hour crossing a time zone days, 50 miles between towns days (which means you do 50 or you do 100, and you can’t do 100 if you don’t start early)…

in oregon, reaching virginia didn’t compute in a time sortof way, more like an event in the unknowable distant future. maybe our feet are dragging because the end is nearing, taking shape. we are almost done, a three month life hiatus, an epic adventure, a ‘transformational journey’….over.

relief (i’m ready)

and panic (i’m not ready)

have i changed enough? learned all i should on an undertaking such as this? have i figured myself out yet? has it been worth it????

that last one is easy. of course its worth it. its worth the peace of mind that i’ll have from doing instead of wondering about doing. theres lack-of-regret there. do i have regrets, obviously. should’ve taken more photos, journaled daily, blogged more, cried less, eaten less food containing HFCS, blah blah blah.

this is everything. sea-level to over ten thousand feet above it, desert hothot heat to freezing mountin rain. i am sunburned and tanned with trialanderror, chilled to the bone with realization, my sweat smells like memories. i’m drenched with fat juicy tears that taste shapeless and vast, those of inarticulatable emotions, well before ‘happy’ or ‘sad’.

have i found answers to my many questions? some, and an important one: that there are no answers exactly but always plenty of questions, endless questions. rather i find moments, beautiful brief ones, where all of existence falls into place and everything hums perfectly, resonates in my core so i understand that something is RIGHT and good. but i knew that before i left.

i am rich with hard-learned lessons, the kind that ache my muscles to the bone and my heart to its beat. those that demand self dependency, and those that shatter it. there is strength in numbers. there is love among us.

there is so much more to this than i could neatly say, than i could hope to presently wrap my brain around.

so here are some photos, instead.

missouri, group camp

crossing the mississippi river into illonois!!

‘shady rest motel’ or ‘shed of shelves for cyclists’, chester, illonois

crossing the ohio river from illinois into kentucky, on a ferry

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