A rebuilding

It’s your first ride – in a long time – on the hardest trail you know.

You go slow (you have no choice). You contemplate the Y in the trail (you’re trying to remember). You check the posted maps (you look for spots along the trail that remind you of bullsh!tting with friends instead - those landmarks work better).

You remember.

You remember the cool weather, the deep sand, the endless climbs. You remember the bonks, the crashes and the finishes - no matter how slow.

You remember how a tough trail can build YOU.

Not your legs, lungs or arms (although, yes, those, too) – but your soul, your grit and your sense of adventure. Those intangibles – things you can’t clock on a sports watch - are what matter most.

You start again. You let yourself be slow. You accept the changes in your body since last season. You let yourself be where you ARE.

And that’s when you realize that the old you is gone - but you are glad for it. The old you was struggling, idling, stalling. The new you is exploring, expecting, searching, open, free. It’s time, you realize, to let her out to f@cking ride again.

When you get home later that afternoon, as you’re taking your bike off the rack, you remember something else: You remember sitting on your front deck on a different afternoon a couple of summers ago.

You remember thinking, “I just want to FEEL again.”

Because you’d become numb by then to huge chunks of your life.

You were shutting down at work. You were smiling as if nothing was wrong. You were saying yes when inside you were screaming, no. You were pretending that things didn’t hurt.

They did.

You had started spending your days playing dead at work, and your nights coming back to life, at home, with your husband and kids. You lost a little ground every day.

Now, it's finally over. You’re starting to feel again. You’re gaining ground again. You’re looking for new trails again. Just last night, you found yourself long after bedtime laughing – over nothing! – with your husband. One’s laughter made the other laugh harder, a round robin of joy.

You’re finding little things matter again. Big things, too. Like steep hills, deep sand, lost breath, hammering hearts.

The intangibles are coming back – the joy, the pride, the dare. And another intangible you'd forgotten about - the internal engine inside you at the trailhead before every ride – is running more so after every ride.

It’s all coming back, one mile at a time. You’re remembering your power - on tough trails here - and everywhere else, too.