Climbing: 200 feet
Average Speed: 17 mph
Winds: Mild headwinds, 5-10 mph all day
Great Bend. Hmmm. Great Bend. Great Bend? I mean, it’s okay, but Great Bend. Maybe more like Pretty Darn Good Bend. That might be a bit more exact. Yeah, I can’t really endorse it beyond that, but I can comfortably go that far. Pretty Darn Good (A Little Bit Soggy) Bend. That might be more like it.
Well, when I got up this morning in Dodge City, Sexybike was bouncing off the walls, back pedaling, pulling wheelies, scattering lubricant, that kind of thing. I said, “Sexybike, what’s wrong?” Predictably, she said nothing because I’m not crazy, and I don’t hear bicycles talk, and if they told me to do illegal or harmful stuff I certainly would not do that. But anyway, something was clearly wrong, and I quickly acceded to her demand to get the heck out of Dodge. I did manage to delay her long enough to get this little photo, though we could just begin to hear the sirens do their thing in the background as I snapped it.
I was yanking her back by the handlebars all the way down the road. I don’t know what the brazen little hussie got herself into last night, but let’s face it, if you’re going to get up to no good, what better place to do it than Dodge City. The posse was nipping at her cog set, but I wouldn’t give her her lead. I needed a rolling rest day, and if that meant she had to get her due, then that was just going to be what had to happen. Somebody’s got to hold her accountable to her lawlessness.
Thank God, by the time we reached Kinsley, the posse had given up the ghost, whether through fatigue or just the realization that nobody had thought to plant a tree in this whole freakin’ state to string up an uppity girlbike we’ll never know. Whatever the case I got my rolling rest day, sitting in a paceline with four other blokes, stopping at the various attractions along the way, Pawnee Rock on the Sante Fe Trail, a community parade in a little town right after the lunch SAG.
The place I want to tell you about, though, is Kinsley. Kinsley claims to be the midpoint of the continental United States, equidistant between New York and San Francisco. It’s a farm community, not a prospering one, of 1600 souls. Ten years ago, there were 2100 here, but they can’t get the kids to stay anymore. The farms have gone corporate, businesses have closed. There’s nowhere to work.
We visited a little museum that had been opened just the day before, literally for the first time ever. It held a preserved sod house, artifacts of farm life donated by residents who had doubtless moved on to communities that weren’t dying and were eager to clean the closets rather than pay the movers. It was run by this elderly gentleman, friendly and chatty like you wouldn’t believe, desperate to hold onto something, desperate to have somebody care about what was disappearing. He was determined that we should sign in, as if each name added would add a day to the relevance of his community and his life. Really, it was a nothing museum. Nothing in it told as rich a story as this gentleman’s presence there, his futile desire that the thumbprint of his community and himself should not fade from the earth.
I’m getting jammed up even writing about this. God, it was so sad, so raw and human, too true. It’s not orderly. This place had no future, just a past and the gouges of scrambling and graceless fingernails in the present. Can a life be the same? Can my life be the same?
I’m trying. I’m trying really hard. Have a great night.
Hi Andy. That you are a writer, as in "creative" is plain to see. How did this come about? What led you to writing. Word is that you are writing a book. What can (do you want) to tell us about that.
ReplyDeleteThe reflection that comes from solo cycling is great for clearing the mind and letting the words come forth. I imagine you pedalling cross-country and composing your story.
Ron
Heya, Ron. Interestingly enough, I was thinking that I needed to come up with a good elevator description of the thing today. Let me work on that.
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