Route 66, a journey

10

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 26 Dec 2018 04:59:00 +0000

Ten years ago today, life went in another direction.

It is still good. Well, after a LOT of work by me it is good. Different but good.

I'm still alive 😉 which is no small thing.

Still riding the metallic orange Waterford that traveled Route 66; it is now red. In fact, after more than ten thousand miles and 5 x 1200Ks, it needs a(nother) new paint job.

Danny & I have moved and it's turning out to be good. Even Bella is happier. She still sleeps on me when I'm stressed which is pretty rare. Hardly ever happens.

This blog had a 'quiet period' during which I did a stint at Google as an IC. I did some good work for them... which you can see the evidence of in daily headlines announcing new products. Then a coworker found this blog and decided to cast political shade on me. Worked well for her... Google decided it wasn't an issue... or maybe 'didn't happen'. Bella was taking care of me a LOT during that time. Now she plays with organic catnip and sleeps.

Today I rode 3.5 hours and mostly didn't think of the accident at all. When I did, it was mainly the list of things that helped with recovery:

Exercise, copius amounts thereof (aerobic, with legs)
Speech therapy. Writing a blog was part of that.
Espresso, pour-over, presspot, mokka, drip. Caffeine in all its glorious forms.
Immersive foreign language program
Family and friends
Diet makeover: no gluten, no dairy
Stress avoidance

Everything above is ongoing...that's how life is different now. Recovery is ongoing.

Maybe, if I write all this down with details, it will make a book 🚲

Some days are good days

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 11 Aug 2018 01:22:00 +0000

Today, right now, news feeds are lighting up...

One thing TBI survivors have to be really REALLY careful about is exposure to chemicals. Everything from medications to environmental exposure to herbicides.

This is a good day, because it's the end of the collective denial about Roundup. And it's the beginning of a new chapter where glyphosate will cease to be sprayed everywhere to control weeds and make the neighbors happy about your neat-looking, carcinogenic yard. Yes, more than one neighbor on our beautiful street in Silicon Valley recommended it. You know what would take care of those weeds? Roundup! It's totally safe!

Takeway #1: Stop using Roundup - it's not safe.

The plaintiff, Dewayne Johnson, and his family paid an unacceptable price for our denial. He's got an aggressive case of lymphoma. The jury awarded him $289 million partly because his health is gone. They assigned a number to the years he's not expected to live. Monsanto stole his health for their own profit, that's why the story is in the Business section. Their lawyers and accountants told them it was worth the risk of a lawsuit someday.

So this good day is mostly for the rest of us. We get the gift of less Roundup for our bodies to process. We get large corporations like Monsanto (and many others) who are forced to adjust their practices. We get hope for a healthier future.

Takeway #2: Some day you may need a lawyer.

I feel grateful for Mr. Johnson and his legal team. They fought hard for us. I regularly hear smack-talk about lawyers and lawsuits, and noticed something. It seems to come from humans who have been lucky so far and are ignorant of that fact. They haven't accidentally dosed themselves with a carcinogen. Been gravely injured in a car wreck. Been born female, or a person of color (or both). Make no mistake, ladies and gentlemen - lawyers are occasionally required. They were required for me and this journey. They were the good guys.

Takeway #3: Buy organic.

FYI farmers regularly spray Roundup on wheat and other crops right before harvest. You've been ingesting Roundup without knowing it! Buy organic to avoid glyphosate in your diet.

Check those bonafides

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 11 Mar 2017 14:30:00 +0000

The feeling came on fast, aching loneliness. It began creeping last night at the hostel and then picked up at dawn, as I rode to the start of the Santa Cruz Randonneurs 200K. The first ride of the season. I watched the birds observe the rising of the sun, lifting together in an effortless, coordinated way above the water. My thoughts were lonely, abandoned thoughts.

Where are all the people I used to ride with? Brave companions of the road. I counted on them to lift me up. What has become of them?

We spent hours together out there, taking care of each other, telling stories. Where's Donn, my brevet buddy? Miss him so much, it hurts. The newbies are pretenders, nothing like us.

Am I really the only one left? How can that be? I'm not ready to go on alone. Why am I the one who's left, out here riding long rides? Maybe it's time to pack it in...

West Cliff Drive might be the most scenic approach to any brevet, anywhere, I roll up at the Santa Cruz Lighthouse, 6:40am, ready to sign in. I'm doing this one, alone, whatever. Leading and facilitating are Lois and Bill, the organizers, longtime randonneurs, longer than me. Many, many kilometers to their credit.

In the next few minutes Jim Bradbury rolls up, followed by Kim Freitas. Both have been randonneuring since before I started in 1998. They were great mentors on Paris-Brest-Paris 1999. I do remember before PBP 2003, that moment in a Breton creperie in St Quentin-en-Yvelines, Jim being so keyed up he pronged a fork high into the air during dinner. Both he and Kim have similar stories about me, I'm sure.

This is possibly the largest grouping of real, bonafide anciens et anciennes in recent memory. We're all here, with more than 20 PBPs among us. There's no need to feel alone.

Of course, Jim and Kim and I ride the whole 200K together. The whole sunny day. On the gorgeous California coast.

Yeah take that, loneliness. Move along!

Don't let that bird fly

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 08 Mar 2017 07:11:00 +0000

Interactions with other humans... they can just drain me of hope. They can feed me, too...

This is Lee, from the Pacific Northwest (Seattle area). We're in San Diego, about to start the Christmas Trip 2012. Took this photo in case it would be useful.

Well, I guess I knew it would be useful.

I first met Lee on this trip a few years ago. Escaping the rain and cold. This time around we recognize each other and Lee asks some casual question, and then another as it spirals into a thread on family dynamics. Hitting close to home since the humans who were in the accident with me, Danny's brother and his wife, happen to be here in the parking lot. Well out of the frame. Avoiding contact.

And it's weird. So the conversation goes quickly to the accident, and the narrative of blame, et cetera. Funny how people often know the right questions to ask. All of this heading to the core of who we are.

Lee's offers up a counter-story, an incredible story that I'll never forget. She has two sisters, one of whom, Sister A, did something on a boat, made a tragic mistake. Sister A's mistake resulted in Sister B not having a leg any more. A rope got wrapped around it and the boat took off from the dock and left the leg behind.

That's not even the interesting part. After the accident Sister A, the one who ripped off the leg with the boat, doesn't talk to Lee any more. She tends to Sister B and takes her to physical therapy and Lee gets to be the bad one. Mind you, Lee was not there, was not responsible, was not even remotely involved. Yet Sister A in her guilt needs to shun someone, exclude her for some murky triangular reason that is never spelled out. If you have sisters, you might recognize this situation as illogical and hurtful and unjust. It's unclean. Which is exactly the point.

Shunned and yet whole, Lee has some advice to share. On my parallel tale and how it all went down, the bizarre injustice and years of blame... she tilts her head a little and says 'hey, don't let that shit bird fly'. I can still hear her saying it. Feel the eye contact and the shrug and the humor too.

Philosophically speaking, girl - don't let it fly over you and drop anything you didn't order. Don't be a victim. Don't suffer other people's baggage and let it become your punishment, your injury, your burden. Don't stand for bird shit raining down on your life.

Keep your spirit intact. Be whole.

It's been 5 years since that sunny December morning in the parking lot. The family dynamics continue and if anything, have gotten worse. But the conversation and the memory and the photo are still massively helpful. The shit bird can fly only if I let it.

For the nth time...don't EVER let it, no matter what.

This

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 28 Feb 2017 02:30:00 +0000

The other day there was a stuffed, heavily taped envelope in our mailbox. The address was familiar, a friend's house. What did I forget?

Inside was actually something new!

Normally I'm not into gifts and the sender is the same way. For us it's about laughing, telling stories and jokes, eating, and maybe doing something outdoors. The good feelings top up everyone's tank for the work week and whatever the next fight may bring.

Sometimes too much comes all at once. Lately it's been raining major stressors, serious life events that have needed dealing with, like death of a family member, job change, chronic injury/pain. None of it within my control.

It doesn't come naturally for me to reach out to another human and talk about suffering. For lots of reasons. Instead I go quiet, silently buckling down.

A friend noticed. She collected all the data points, little factoids, and put everything together and just came out and said I had a lot going on. It would be all right to feel overwhelmed. At that point, I might have exhaled for the first time in months. Someone saw what I was going through, someone was a witness. There's no stronger antidote to difficulty and pain and no better way to survive it.

So I'm thinking that this delicate silver thing, lovely and almost shocking in its optimism, is not even the real gift.

Two worlds

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 27 Feb 2017 07:19:00 +0000

In January, over lunch at work, a new colleague shared that she'd read every inch of this blog.

Then after searching for me on Facebook, all that came up was a damning podcast from Trailer Talks. She recommended I take a good look at my social media profile. In a way that left no doubt, hey - you don't look that credible. You should do something about that food on your face.

OK...

That was when it began with this colleague. I guess you could call it political behavior. Hints about making audio recordings of meetings. Writing things down. Look you forgot to lock your monitor! Not quite meeting the bar, performance-wise. (Too bad, damaged by a brain injury.) She'd found the dirt on me, on the Internet, and dirt can be politically useful.

After all, I do work in a truth-free zone, a utopian bubble where no one can admit to anything. My colleagues can't be vulnerable with each other, or quirky, or flawed. We pretend to be strong all day long.

For a few weeks, I thought ill of this person. I let the conversation and the behavior that followed percolate for a while. Went on a few bike rides, in case there was something to salvage from the experience. Maybe she was a lost cause (or not). But maybe, just maybe, there was something to be learned here...

Despite my anger, this week I found something. The story of my recovery is not told that well. The hopeful part of the story. This blog tells (some of) the dark stuff, the outpouring of disbelief and disappointment that I needed to express. If you have a brain injury, even best case scenario you can expect everyone who is supposed to be helpful, family, doctors, employers, insurance companies, to slide out from under you or lash out. Guess we can add colleagues to the list....

That's just the way it is right now. We know so little about brain injury, and how to diagnose and heal it. In the face of uncertainty people are not altogether good. Some of these people act brain-damaged when they are not.

Yet the story as it's told here doesn't say enough about the light. How far I've come and how far everyone can go, with effort and self-reliance, not to mention a few tips from someone who's been there. I was scrambling and trying and working so hard at the time. I didn't know how to put that into words.

I'll work on it.

It might take a little while. After all I have a demanding full-time job with at least one colleague who believes what people believed 20 years ago: that brain injury is a permanent, intractable thing. A stigma.

In the meantime, a strategic tip for everyone. If you want your brain to work well and be healthy for the long haul, consider incorporating aerobic exercise into your daily routine.

Baggage

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 20 Feb 2017 07:19:00 +0000

To be gluten free, and to travel (outside your house) you need props.

This GF bun from Trader Joe's has seen a whole lot of the local area. It was carried in my bike bag 170 miles before this photo was taken. (Only 2 rides, folks.) It's my ticket to being able to roll up and order a sandwich or burger pretty much anywhere, and not turn into a sad sack excuse for a living thing who can't turn the pedals.

Yeah, it's cool. And it's been places. On a ride of any length these days, you'll find one of these in my bike bag.

Out here on my own

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 07 Nov 2016 03:27:00 +0000

Exactly one week ago we were heading back toward Portland from the Oregon Coast. It was a grey, rainy Sunday afternoon, like today. This song came on and it resonated so strongly that my sister, in the back seat behind Danny, was looking out the rain-streaked window, crying. Then I was too. Then I reached back to hold her hand.

And thought how lucky am I to have someone's hand to hold.

(If there's someone nearby whose hand you can hold, do it now.)

By the line "we miss you, we love you, come on home" I was sobbing. It's been only seven weeks since we lost our mom.

The day she died was an achingly perfect sunny fall day, before the weather turned, another Sunday afternoon. I'll always remember it because I was on the way to her on a bike.

I'll remember exactly how the sun felt, the warmth of the air on my skin, the massive peaceful sky, the beautiful valley where she lived all laid out like a painting. There is no way I could forget any part.

And from that day on, no one can say "we miss you, we love you, come on home".

There's something about a mother's love, about acceptance and understanding, about home that every single human being needs. I need someone to miss me. If anything in the world is sacred, it's this particular brand of love.

Utter, visceral, belonging.

Gluten slavery

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 04 Jul 2016 16:00:00 +0000

Today was supposed to be a long bike ride to celebrate a big milestone at work. The weather is gorgeous and the days are long.

I wake up before dawn. Something wrong, not rested. Sweating. Running for the bathroom. Not a good start...

Breakfast yesterday was coffee and a corn tortilla filled with avocado and spicy green salsa. Dinner, chicken and corn and veggies. Delicious. Everything made here at home, gluten-free and safe. For lunch, a tasty bowl of shrimp and veggies and basil and mint over rice noodles. Soy sauce and lemon and fish sauce...

Honing in on the cupboard I yank out the bottle of fish sauce: Three Crabs decorate the label. The last ingredient: hydrolyzed vegetable protein. The Internet says this is actually hydrolyzed WHEAT protein. Argh!

They put the gluten in the fish sauce and then they lied about it on the label!

The morning is spent lying low in bed, shaking and dozing, riding the waves. I wish I had a different body. More than anything I want to be free of this. Bella stays nearby to help; she seems to know.

Those posts and bits of advice from GF gurus on the Internet. Go through the cupboards and the fridge, they say. Read the labels and throw out EVERYTHING that could have gluten hiding in it! At least your own kitchen will be safe and you won't accidentally poison yourself.

The pantry purge idea, at first I found it a little absurd, maybe even extreme. Throw out food? There's still someone who can eat gluten in the house. Maybe I'll even get better and be able to eat it again, someday. Check EVERY label? Fish sauce can have gluten?

Well I totally get it now. On board.

First things first, the problem at hand. Digestive enzymes for gluten, probiotics, and diatomaceous earth. Lots of water. Banana with peanut butter. Dessert from last night, that's sweet and smooth and full of calories. (Vegan GF chocolate mousse from good friends!) Restock the liver with glycogen, have a nap, slowly recover.

Instead of riding somewhere on a gorgeous road, I'm indoors reading search results and shopping to keep this from happening again. A gluten-free brand of fish sauce, which is most of them. (Three Crabs got the lowest taste score, anyway.) One bottle, why not two? Buckwheat flour, 100% buckwheat soba noodles. Most buckwheat pastas have wheat but on the Internet you can find the ones that don't. Coconut aminos, because umami is necessary and important.

Fill up a box, $50 for free shipping. Gluten-free is expensive and inconvenient, and failure is lurking everywhere.

Even at home.

Defy gravity

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 20 Jun 2016 05:30:00 +0000

Compared to most places on the planet, where I live is fast and stressful. It's not a big city by population, but it's part of a large urban area and the environment is man-made, high-speed, competitive. Maybe even disrespectful. In general, it's not normal to be glad to see another human being.

This is the theme in many settings: the freeway derby, the way people walking on a sidewalk see each other as obstacles, the way in the supermarket we hope you'll just move along. Even on a recreational trail, the humanoids can be rude and self-righteous.

There's a reason that in the Bay Area, you're never far from a cup of coffee, whether Starbucks, Peet's, or independent roaster. My dad used to joke that if you fall one cup of coffee behind the crowd, they'll run you over. The vibe is definitely not relaxed or laid back. And it takes its toll.

Maybe it's an introvert thing, but for balance I need regular dips into a quiet, natural, peaceful environment. It's the only way to to reset my blood pressure, cortisol, adrenaline back to sustainable levels. I can actually feel the muscles in my body relax. It's an electro-chemical reaction.

Sometimes, that environment is the road (on a bike). Continuous movement, flow, is a real place of its own. And exercise is a powerful way of managing stress. But exercise itself is not enough. Working out inside in a gym day in, day out, or riding in the shoulder of a busy highway, those wouldn't work.

Fortunately, there are other ways. The fringe of the urban boundary is 3 miles from home. On the other side lie some of the most beautiful cycling roads you'll find anywhere.

Of course when I can wrangle it, you'll find me even further afield...

Here, all the lead weights in my diver's vest just vaporize. There's a giddiness to defying gravity. Like that, I can breathe again, I'm OK. I'm on the surface.

So it's a little humbling, daunting, to face that I have a real need to periodically recharge. There's an extra requirement, a tax on awareness, time, and effort. In the rat race where faster is always better, it can be a weakness. A vulnerability.

On the other hand, I'm lucky to have access to these places. A worthy bike. The gate in the driveway, four days from my house. This is Northern California. A visitor once said that in 20 minutes in any direction from any freeway, you'll find yourself in the middle of beautiful nature. The land of plenty.

Writing this post has made me wonder: might there be people in the world who are not as lucky? Who do not have a way to renew themselves?

DIY Father's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 19 Jun 2016 21:00:00 +0000

Though hundreds of miles separate us, the whole day is saturated with memories and appreciation of my dad.

Email is impersonal, easy, superficial. Also fast and convenient. Being together, sitting together at the table, that would be ideal. A card would be good. Email is better than nothing.

So I write the most ordinary-looking email about an experience that pushed to the front of the line, a vivid, simple, happy memory. First grade, parent show-and-tell. He brought a flute he'd made from a stick of bamboo. What I really cared about that day is he showed up in front of my class. I can still feel his hand, warm and muscular, accommodating. All I could bring myself to say was 'this is my dad'.

For no apparent reason one day he'd gone in search of a piece of bamboo (who carries bamboo in northern California? And why?). Someone had it. The taper was very long and awkward, green at one end. He sawed off a chunk of 12 inches or so with a firm short saw, probably the one from the mitre box. There were calculations...it had to be a particular length.

The details of the process are quite fuzzy: how the finger holes got drilled, what tool was used. Design was important. spacing was important. Placement and diameter.

I remember the end product well. It looked a little ordinary. Brown and green, irregular stripes. It looked very much like an unfinished stick of bamboo. But if you held it and blew just so, sound came out. A little rough but an original voice. No one else's dad did that.

I've come to recognize that voice as extraordinary. To appreciate other voices that are rough and surprising and true. What's even richer, at this point, is knowing I belong to someone, having a hand to hold onto. Even if some days it's all I can do to stand here, holding on.

The longest day

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 28 May 2016 02:30:00 +0000

The summer solstice is not for a couple of weeks. But today's ride is the longest I've ever done in a single go, self-supported, from Florence to (hopefully) Brookings OR. 160 miles. To get to Dad's in the allotted time means 1 day out of 3+ on the bike needs to be very long indeed.

This photo, taken at the end of a long and blustery descent, the Waterford quivering and gathering speed in a strong cross wind, it signifies something. I'm gonna make it. This is finally the moment of confidence in reaching Brookings and my room at the Spindrift, already paid for. Looks like I won't even need lights!

Something like 18 miles is all that's left. My body is not even that tired. Somehow it feels normal and natural to turn the pedals and keep turning them all day long.

In ~8 miles there will be another little descent to a bridge. I'll be gazing west at the infinite Pacific Ocean, and won't see that thing in the shoulder and will roll over it, without caring. Nearing the goal. Blissful from so much exertion. A few seconds later on the bridge there will be a popping sound, and the hiss of all the air leaving what turns out to be the rear tire, all at once.

While I repair the flat, the gorgeous rosy and blue light of dusk fades to dark grey. The pump that normally works fine today balks at pushing more than ~50 psi into the tube. At least 80 is needed. The Waterford does roll, but downhill it wobbles madly and uphill it's as heavy as a bale of hay.

I keep my weight over the saddle, off the back wheel, so there won't be a pinch flat, another flat to deal with. The good people who own the Spindrift would then retire for the night, wondering what happened to that crazy woman, their last customer of the day, oh well. And all my hope and optimism and patience would drain away, as it does when scared and alone on a dark highway with a barely functioning machine.

A foil emergency blanket from the ACE Hardware store in Bandon now seems like a very good thing to have.

Within an hour, from confidence to utter despair to hobbling the last 10 miles into Brookings. It's the failure curve that adventurers have to learn to deal with. I arrive bleary-eyed and sore, smudging the motel slip with greasy fingers. A hot shower with soap and shampoo makes everything right again. A hot towel from the microwave starts to loosen up my lower back. A bag of Fritos for morale (not to mention electrolytes).

I think it's better to learn how to manage a sudden change of fortune, far better than what most humans do. Most of us seek comfort, avoid situations that might bring risk, contort ourselves and everything else around that. At the end of the day, what's the cost?

There's something about knowing I'm just a few moments away from losing all the air in my rear tire. It keeps my expectations in check, keeps me uncomfortable and thinking clearly, in the moment, forthright and honest.

Falling

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 15 May 2016 00:44:00 +0000

It started with a jump from a platform (or something) to an open box that was on top of a Very Tall Bookcase, at least 20 feet high.

I went feet first, aiming for a big yellow lab curled up in the box. And that worked out OK. I landed in the right place, with room to spare. The dog lifted its head to greet me.

Then the box started to tip. From my perspective looking down at the dog in the box on the bookcase, it wasn't possible to see whether the box was centered on top, or offset slightly. Which would definitely make it unstable.

The box, dog and I all went overboard, in slow motion. It was a long way down and there was no hope of rescue or escape. This is bad, I thought. This won't end well. The pull of gravity as you go down faster and faster is breathtaking. It's really not something you want to experience. You don't want to be conscious for that part.

So of course, I woke up, just in time to hear myself cry out in fear before hitting the ground.

Then something really interesting happened. Bella, sleeping at Danny's feet, immediately got up and walked over to me and settled herself down on my body. Calm. She knew just what to do.

I'm so lucky, sometimes it's hard to believe.

Yes to rain

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 08 May 2016 05:16:00 +0000

I'm not riding a bicycle today. I can fully enjoy the weather. Soft grey clouds and starting late in the morning, rain. Water from the sky.

Rain is so good. If you don't believe rain is good, then you've never experienced 5 years of drought.

It's good to just stand there on the porch and watch it come down. Listen to the drops smack against the lip of the watering can. Smell the smells coming from the grateful herbs and flowers and shrubs and trees.

Attention!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 18 Apr 2016 03:39:00 +0000

Have you been thinking this blog is about me, riding my bike?

If so, I have news. It's about recovery from brain injury, which involves exercise. And exercise builds attention.

One of the most surprising things about keeping this blog is that with anything brain-related, people don't realize that they can help themselves. They feel powerless and do not know how to go about increasing, for example, their budget of attention. They don't know what role attention plays, in daily life. We are just all so clueless about how our brains get things done.

Attention is the invisible partner. It enables learning, listening, tracking, planning. It brings things into focus. You can't feel it working but anyone who struggles with attention, struggles in almost all every aspect of their life.

If this describes you or someone you love, here are some empowering self-help tips.

Pariah

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 18 Apr 2016 02:07:00 +0000

A few people have asked, what the heck's going on? Or not going on, here at Route 66 a journey? No posts. Did I get a big promotion at work? Was there an overdose of exercise?

All I can say is, my bad.

When Danny and I got back from France, it was great. Post-vacation glow. All the experiences, different places and people I talk to, they invigorate me. Always, always I learn a lot, more than expected. We came back home to our lovey chat noir, convinced that 99.9% of humanity is fundamentally good.

Over the next six months I had to reconsider that idea.

A merger is underway between my organization and a neighboring one at work. Thankfully, someone leaked the news to the outside world, so I can talk about it here. Otherwise looking at me, you would see one stressed-out individual. You would think it was a personal problem.

The trip back to Silicon Valley was a harbinger of things to come. Air France flies the largest planes in the world right now, so new that things can and do go wrong. In this case with one of the engines. You can't help but be relieved, after hours of delays, to not get on that plane. They find another Airbus A380 but the flight crew expires and we are purged back into the terminal at Charles de Gaulle. So many people are displaced it's a circus, essentially, trying to find seats for all the humans on other aircraft.

The trickery of the airline employees, the cannibal gate agents. The fact that it's predictable makes it no less degrading. The 16-euro meal vouchers, good for a candy bar and a bottle of water. 18 hours in a fucking airport, etc. It's all been said before. No doubt you've been there, too.

Eventually I get back and no one in my workgroup asks how it was, working in the Paris office. No one is curious. (The food's better, and at least in August, it's quieter. Got a lot done.) The reward, the reward is a small mountain of email to get through. Lots people who expect me to help them. I'm a group of one. This seemed like a good idea when I was hired, but it also means no back-up for vacations. People who could care less about how to be gluten- and dairy-free in France, people who were not riding PBP, people who were not on vacation at the beginning of September, they wanted their due. They did not feel taken care of.

Most of all my manager. Who promptly loaned me to another project full-time. A new project, on fire. No email to the old project saying I was on hiatus. Lots of multi-tasking. Lots of unhappy stakeholders.

The new project, the one on fire? Failed. The existing project? Way behind, in trouble, people furious. Me? exhausted.

That will teach me, not to care.

It does not suck

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 16 Apr 2016 03:49:00 +0000

It's been almost 5 years since I left a job I was really invested in. And a few months later, started this blog. I'd like to say there was some plan, a notion of what would happen, that I would get better, that I would find people who could help and everything would be all right.

In reality, I remember being overwhelmed with negative feelings: sadness, anger, betrayal, disbelief, fear of running out of money and dying a pauper from early-onset Alzheimer's. What the future held, I did not know.

It feels really good to be here, in this place looking back. And there's a reason that it's today, a reason beyond perspective and gratitude for many gifts.

Today through LinkedIn I learned that the remainder of my team was laid off. By my count, it's at least the fifth layoff at that site in 5 years. A search engine barfed up some official statements that made me glad to be a spectator:

"The layoffs were a recalibration in response to changes in the business [...] some of the jobs are moving to locations closer to customers."
"the [performance] evaluations led to job loss for the employees ranked in the bottom 10 percent.“It’s painful, but it’s an exercise we go through … to ensure we have a high performance culture”
"we're getting out of the cellular modem business"
"we are constantly adjusting our workforce to meet the demands of the most competitive market in the world... The pace of change is increasing in the industry, accelerated further by industries converging"

Is your BS meter going off? Mine too. Hopefully the rest of my team is not compromised financially by this, or emotionally, or in any other way. I'm glad to be free of the place, and maybe they'll get there too.

It still feels like a personal and professional betrayal, a waste of life energy, and a bad investment of my time. I'll never get those years back. I have lost trust in the system of work, in employers and colleagues and maybe that's something that will propel me into a new phase of being on my own. I was lucky to find a lot of help getting through. I will also say this - it's delicious to be on the other side, looking back.

They finally had to pay out. For a former CFO running the company, who counts pennies like they're his own and there will never be any more, it probably caused him physical pain.

It does not suck.

Come together, right now

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 28 Feb 2016 05:41:00 +0000

Two weeks ago I rode the SFR Two Rock 200K, which was supposed to be an easy ride. It has over 6000' of elevation gain, as I discovered. Didn't think to check.

Another factor might have been the rider on the front of the tandem, the guy whose jersey pockets I stared at the whole ride, a very strong cyclist. He and and his wife Emma, the regular stoker, set a record on RAAM last summer. They were taking a little breather during the fall and winter months. That's where I come in. The bike itself was magnesium, every bit as light and responsive as a single. The bike was not the issue.

At the midpoint of the ride, as the hamlet of Valley Ford came into sight around a curve, it was barely 10am. At the same time, a rare view when it's just me and the Waterford: the lead group turning south on Highway 1, leaving the control. Maybe 5 or 10 minutes ahead? I felt an unfamiliar twinge. Is this how it feels to be among the 1%?

As you might have guessed, there was no time for existential questions. It unfolded like the thing it was: an 8-hour spin class. Constant, intentional forward motion. Almost no coasting. The controls were places to get in and get out of, downing fluids, sugar, electrolytes. On hills, as my quads screamed and refused to push harder, the hamstrings took over, using the upstroke. Those infamous rollers between Tomales and Point Reyes Station, we tried to scoop them, using momentum on the descents to reach (almost) the top of the next rise. We pulled a large pack of singles and they stuck to our wheel like packing tape, no chit-chat.

At the Palace Market in Point Reyes Station, there was a bench and the noonday sun. Munching a sandwich, I could not have been happier. Or more hammered.

I like fast. I like early. With a taste of that kind of speed I almost get it now, why the fasties delight in pushing each other so hard... The pain is really just a side effect. Everything else about going fast is good.

Lots of folks on the Two Rock have been hibernating. For many this was the first long ride since last August, since Paris-Brest-Paris. So the conversation starter of choice was "how was your PBP"? It echoed in my head. How was my PBP? I struggled to answer. It seems like a long time ago.

Someone said "did you hear about Lois? She had some kind of accident outside the control at Dreux. Broke her wrist. It was in the RUSA magazine..." With shame, I had to admit I hadn't read the magazine at all. It lay unopened on the piano bench at home. Other people's stories were in there, but I haven't been ready to read them.

First I need to tell my own.

A package from Europe

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 17 Feb 2016 06:07:00 +0000

Danny found these at our local market. The one right down the street. Oh Happy Day!

Seriously, this is a brand we found in many stores in France. They make stuff like bread and cakes and cookies, only gluten-free!

The bread and cakes are shelf-stable, so they're just acceptable. Not bad. Pretty serviceable.

But the wafer cookies are extrEMEly yummy and wonderful!

Dessert is mostly a no-op if you're gluten-free. It's not as big a deal as I thought it would be, giving it up. Most days that's just fine. Which is totally surprising because I used to have a sweet tooth.

But tonight, there will be a dessert and it will be flaky wafer cookies!

Unfinished business

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 18 Nov 2015 12:16:00 +0000

Normally I don't do yard work for fun.

When we got home from vacation, there was lots of unfinished business waiting. By definition, it was stuff I'd rather not do and rather not face. If this was the fun stuff that gives energy rather than sapping it, the stuff that makes life worth living, I'd have found a way to take care of it immediately.

Right?

Well, not quite. There were several exceptions. One, my financial person had switched company affiliations so there was a stack of paper with little colored Sign Here arrows sticking out. Oh no, not again... meaningless paperwork.

And there was that legal matter. The last one from the accident. Legal matters hurry for no one - in fact, it is a well-understood strategy they must teach in law school, how to make things take As Long As Possible. Unlikely though it seems, there was progress on that front.

Lies, abuse and surly silence for years. Now, progress. The thought of closing all that off and being done with it lifted me up. There I was, blowing leaves around the back yard, making little piles. Making everything neat and beautiful.

There was a meeting, followed by more stupid lawyer games. While the insurance company seemed ready to deal, its partner in crime (my former employer) was not. I was fighting a constant urge to speak my mind. I wanted them to admit what they put me through. There was a repeating loop in my head, about the law and accountability. If people are accountable, corporations have to be too. But I could say nothing.

Then, the day came.

It wasn't enough money, by any stretch. They didn't admit to a thing. But pay they did.

Se reposer

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 23 Aug 2015 23:33:00 +0000

The rain feels like an old friend I haven't seen in years.

Three weeks ago now, I left home. On Sunday morning after a tough Mt. Tam Double, I unhitched the Waterford and put it in the padded case. Said goodbye to Bella (on the bed) and Danny (at the curb at SFO) and loaded myself, the clumsy bike blob, and a red duffle into an aluminum tube bound for Paris. No small project, that.

The idea was to get there early and get over jet lag which seems to take forever now. And significantly, figure out if, if, IF a person who can't ingest gluten can even survive in France.

In short, to get my bearings.

The first two weeks sped by, working from a "hot desk" in the Paris office. Yes, working! I felt like a flame-eater, juggling projects on fire and timezones and jet lag, until I was choking on my own effort. Trying to be a good Airbnb guest, trying not to get too lost, trying not to get sick from food (or anything else). Succeeded at all these things...mostly.

The third week was Paris-Brest-Paris. Which is literally one thing after the next. From landing in the western suburbs on Friday afternoon, to taking care of all the administrative stuff, to riding from control to control, within the time limits. Without crashing. Or eating gluten.

Oh, what a circus!

Danny arrived, and we decamped to Burgundy for a couple of days. I slept in the car. Then we headed for a B&B in a remote little valley near Grenoble...

...where it happened to be raining. Real rain, wet stuff coming down for hours. We did not feel it was ruining our vacation. Rain has been rare lately in California. Beyond hydrology, rain does this great thing.

It says slow down, be patient. Do not charge up a mountain pass on a bike, or on foot for that matter. Do not explore historical ruins, or picturesque villages. Do not seek adventure. The world does not need you to move around right now. Stay put!

And that's what happened. We had a rest day. We stayed indoors, in our comfortable and beautifully renovated room, gazing across the field at a rock, and the changing light. The only sound was the rain coming down. We read, and took a nap. The only thing on the calendar was dinner (delicious and gluten free).

Try doing that in Paris, or during a 1200K. Or at home.

The more it slips away

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 13 Aug 2015 21:00:00 +0000

The more you try to control something, the more it slips away

-Jorge Aguirre, personal trainer and former Marine

Marly-le-Roi is all traces and outlines now. A study in negative spaces. They say nothing here, not any more.

At the end of the path and up the hill, that flat spot is where the chateau used to be. Lavish all-night parties. Over there were the guest cottages. Ponds full of fish. A pool just for horses, where they could lean down to drink then wade right in. Over there is the sculpture garden, what's left of it. The sculptures are too white and too perfect, because, well, they're copies. The originals are in the Louvre.

There is something that draws me to ruins. Maybe it's the stories they have to tell. Maybe it's a fascination with failure, which we hardly ever talk about. Yet there it is, the physical evidence of some human ambition, no more. Hard to deny. It took planning and desire, time and work and money. And it ended up falling to pieces and revealing all its secrets. How exactly does that happen?

Marly is a good place to ask this question, because of Louis XIV. He was at its center and we know a lot about him. The king had a system for everything; nothing left to chance. Absolute power. A highly-structured religion. The manicured, scripted expressions of art, architecture, horticulture, and music at court. The hierarchy of titles in the nobility, along with wealth, appearance, reputation, gender, lineage. A system of protocol for human behavior, rigid and unforgiving.

French, a complicated language that was not widely spoken. Even in France.

Everything you saw here, every interaction you had, reminded you of the king. So much control! If you received an invitation, it meant you had an in with him. You had mastered the complicated layers of systems, as a member of the aristocracy you spoke French well, and so far anyway, you hadn't been caught conspiring against le Roi Soleil.

Today anyone passing by can just step over a threshold. No invitation, no hard work conforming or scheming, nothing like that. Anyone can have the silence and solitude and bird calls. Free, unfettered, temporary. The sky is wide open, for your thoughts to run wild.

For some reason, it gives me faith.

All fall down

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 13 Aug 2015 04:28:00 +0000

What is this...a European beech? That would be my guess. A shallow, spreading root system, multiple trunks with scaly red-grey bark. It's been growing here a long time and each tree is unique, making it hard to say for sure.

It is an old tree, from the roots and bark and height. Its genus and species may be uncertain but its origins are not. This tree and all its neighbors were planted and cultivated by human beings starting around the year 1670. Which means it can't be more than 350 years old.

If it is a European beech, it has found the perfect spot: a steep slope overlooking a humid valley. While individual trees have lasted for 300 years, their normal lifespan is more like 150-200 years. It's likely a descendant of an original tree that was a seedling in the late 17th or early 18th century.

Happily for me, traveling the shady paths on a summer afternoon, the trees of Marly-le-Roi are flourishing. Of the human beings who used to live and visit here there is barely a trace.

Dans les années 1670 Louis XIV a fait construire un château non loin de Versailles à Marly-le-Roi. Son intention était d'avoir une demeure où il pourrait se détendre entouré seulement de quelques courtisans loin du faste de Versailles. Bien sûr, comme à Versailles le château était entouré de bassins, de statues et de fontaines majestueuses. Aujourd'hui il ne reste plus que le parc et quelques statues, le château et les bâtiments annexes ont été entièrement détruits.

It was the private bolt hole of Louis XIV, the seventeenth century monarch who did not share my socialist worldview. He built a luxurious, exclusive theme park full of statues, pools, and sculptures. Not to mention a small chateau.

Louis discovered Marly and bought the estate in 1676. Work began the following year. He was tired of Versailles, which was full of noblemen and official French values. He wanted a retreat for himself and a select few whom he favored with an invitation.

Originally, it was a deep valley and a swamp. There was an abundance of ground water, even drinking water for the royal table, something that Versailles lacked. The location was secluded, and the estate as it took shape was on a modest scale compared with Versailles. Buildings and pavilions and pools and gardens were distributed across the property, not concentrated in one area as a display of wealth and power. The bald patches I saw in the clearings are the footprints of former buildings.

If you want to read more about what Marly was like, check out this blog post from a boutique architecture firm in Paris. If you want just a quick snapshot, in 1724 the estate looked something like this:

You can imagine the size of the crew tasked with maintaining the grounds and buildings! So many projects were going on day and night that visitors imagined fairies must be roaming the estate, transforming it:

Where I left a lake, I find a grove and a bosquet; where I left a forest, I find a large basin, into which some thirty admirably beautiful carp will be released this evening.

-Madame de Maintenon

Some of the trees and plants were grown on site but many were transplants, brought in from elsewhere. Almost everything, including the carp, was imported (except water). There must have been a steady procession of delivery vehicles coming through the gates.

Louis spent copious amounts of money; Marly cost at least as much as Versailles. The complete reworking of a landscape was costly and complicated to maintain. The method of selecting guests was complicated. The custom machine for moving water around was complicated. At the end of the day, it could not be sustained.

Ruines d'une terrasse dans le parc de Marly, c. 1780 Hubert Robert

During the summer and fall of 1789, instead of fairies it was starving, angry peasants who were roaming the countryside near Paris. Versailles was heavily guarded, Marly was more vulnerable and already in decline. The buildings were pillaged and left to ruin. Many of the statues were removed to Paris as a defensive measure (where they ended up in the Louvre). A few years later the chateau was sold to an industrialist. He turned it into a cotton mill and then a factory for making bedsheets.

When the factory failed, the entire chateau was demolished and its stones and lead from the roof and any other materials of value were sold. The following year, Napoleon Bonaparte bought the property on behalf of the state. When that empire dissolved in 1815, Marly was abandoned to the elements. Nature transformed it from a fabulous retreat to a set of ruins to a walled garden to a wall. Only the trees were equipped to survive.

The workers who planted them and changed the bulbs in the flower beds daily and swapped the giant carp from one pond to another at the whim of the Sun King, do you think they knew this was coming?

An open door

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 08 Aug 2015 21:30:00 +0000

Suppose you were pushing a bicycle up a big hill on a warm, sleepy afternoon and saw this. What would you do? Would you press on, or put a foot down and investigate?

To tell the truth - and the truth is important - this isn't exactly what I saw. It was the view from the other side of the wall, the street side. A motorized scooter parked on the cobblestone entryway, just out of sight, inviting me in. Essentially pointing to the open door saying 'people can go in here'. The stone wall stretches for at least a kilometer, delineating something. It might very well be private property but there's that open door.

Across the threshold, paths and greenery and open space in all directions. Where trees meet the sky, a definite horizon. There's no kiosk at the entrance, no admissions fee, no parking lot. There are no buildings at all, no cars or humans. Am I dreaming? Is this really the outskirts of Paris?

It's that dead time between noon and 2pm. This door is probably not the main entrance and somewhere out of sight its guardians are enjoying a fabulous lunch on a terrace. I move forward cautiously. A bounded space that's not entirely wild, not tamed or manicured, tended but apparently not owned. What is it?

The Waterford handles itself with grace on the paths, which lead through the trees from one clearing to the next. It steers nicely around a few humans out for a walk. With hardly any loss of traction, it bears me with speed and security to the heart of this massive, understated park. It almost feels like cheating to travel in such an efficient way and I fully expect a shout of outrage from an authority figure. But none comes. This is France, land of the bicycle. It appears to be completely legal.

A clearing gives a view of a small lake, with two or three clusters of picnickers sitting at the edge. There are intermittent bare patches in the grass, all rectangular in shape. There's a sculpture garden with classical, stone figures.

It's enormous and beautiful. I spend a lovely hour, wandering and reading signs. They are in French, which I'm grateful to be able to read, with a hand-drawn map that makes absolutely no sense. The chateau? There's no chateau here...

This is Marly-le-Roi. Never heard of it. The town on the other side of the door had the same name. I do find a museum (closed until 3) at the edge of the property, at the main entrance. I leave happy, but confused as hell.

On the other side

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 08 Aug 2015 19:30:00 +0000

Word to the wise: do not just hop on your bike and ride out of Paris. The city itself is plenty bike-friendly, after years of effort. The suburbs, not so much. Really not at all.

And don't try to escape with just a smartphone. What if it is Saturday morning and you've been jet-lagged and starved for exercise all week. A Garmin (which you don't have) is mandatory. Better yet, a train to carry you past all the bad stuff to the outer reaches of Gotham.

Otherwise you'll be miserable, somewhere like here, in the no man's land past La Defense. No end in sight, scared, and incurring the wrath of drivers as they swerve around you in the narrow lane.

Never mind the Parc Vexin, wherever it is in this mess. How am I going to make it back to the apartment safely? Not by this route! So how?

Finally a sign for an RER and Metro station. Blue block letters in a blue circle. Huge relief. This one says it's Maisons-Lafitte; any one will do. I'm almost in tears, I'm so relieved. Yes, yes. I'll train it back into the city. No need to do that thing again. No need to figure out what went wrong, either. It's a kind of urban mercy.

The next worry: my phone's battery is draining fast. Google Maps shows some green space up ahead. I'll ride in that direction, holding onto the bearings of the train station. Just being able to spin and relax, it feels good.

The green space turns out to be St-Germain-en-Laye. Well really, this:

Les jardins du chateau de Saint-Germain-en-Laye (La Defense in the background)

The formal gardens of a very old chateau.

Not being a cathedral person and not a castle person either, whenever possible I steer clear. (In California, this is easy.) For example, never been to Versailles. Couldn't care less about Louis XIV. All that splendor and corruption comes tumbling down eventually. You think you're so great and then, dust underfoot. Just wait long enough.

The same goes for formal gardens. All that control...who wants it? I long for the unruly nature just beyond the boundary. My eye is drawn there, and then I follow.

It is definitely quieter here, more peaceful. There is a calming force to arranged beauty. It's orderly! Taking a moment of respite in the green space, I wonder about its stories. Who else rested here, how did this manicured thing with trees all in rows come to be? It took a lot of human labor to do all this.

(That's another thing - the people who invested their energy in building these places did not get to enjoy them.)

There is more than one reason places like this exist. Ego, for one. You need a really big open space to show off your really big wealth. Yet it also feels as if whoever decided to build a compound here might have needed something calm and apart. An antidote to the crowded urban center. A blank canvas where they could express themselves more freely than back there across the river.

The rest of today's accidental route will usher me past not one but two more massive royal estates, Marly-le-Roi and Versailles. I'll never be completely on board; for me the exaggerated display of luxury will never be magical, like Disneyland. I still won't pay to go inside the castle. My heart will be with the people who had to plant the trees.

But now I kind of get why they're here.