The Afterglow

 

Every Tuesday after a section is completed I feel great! I kind of feel mentally euphoric on Saturday evening through Monday too, but Tuesdays are better.  Tuesday is when the muscle and  mental fatigue ends and I just feel fit. The emotional glow of the weekend's success lingers, for days.  It's a fabulous feeling. 

It's possible that this elevated mood is just joy from being away from the routine at home and eating meat while I'm "on the road". But I think its a kind of payback for the effort I put out.  

But,  over and above these positive feelings is a sense of great personal satisfaction. This stems from two separate things.  One is from my development as a touring cyclist.  As each week passes as I range farther from the safety and comfortof home, I gain confidence in my fitness and determination.  These are the assets that will power me on into the world that I've daydreamed and read about for a year or more. Always in the back of my mind is that little dark echo: "You're dreaming,  you will never go far. You're too old,  you don't have the fitness or tenacity to succeed.  What about certain intersection,  how will you get through there alive?" All the self doubt stuff gets stiffened down and rendered less powerful by a new found skillset that's been honed on the road.  I now can't doubt that I possess the toolkit to go further.  

The second higher order reward for section biking is the "spiritual" element.  I'm not saying I've transformed into a Minor Yogi or anything. I think what happens is that you spend time alone meditating pn cycling and free of the whitenoise of tv, radio and domestic busy-ness, and get to know yourself better.  I've found myself also isolating from the Mainstream World of Cars, Shopping Centres and Real Estate and noticing changes in geography,  bird song and the peace of movement.  The pilgrimage thing,  provides a greater purpose or goal to my weekly rides,  but at this point that stuff is unprocessed, a little unfathomable.  The process of cycle meditation actually locks you into thoughts of  direct  concern: keep left, drink,  essay,  sore butt. The mind is rarely free to detour into deeper spiritual matters. They are there in the background and add weight and purpose but just at the moment are bit too woowoo to grab hold of. 

Buen Camino