Biking with Geoff

Date: June 16
Mileage: 30.7
June mileage: 344.3
Temperature upon departure: 65

Geoff and I both spend a lot of time cycling, but rarely together. There are several of reasons for this. Like many people, our schedules and abilities only brush together in thin strands. He works afternoons; I work evenings. He's training hard for serious races; I'm still leery about laying hard on the cranks. Geoff has technical experience that stretches back to the days when I still believed 10-speeds were the end-all of cycling; I ... well ... I'm still focused on keeping that whole crank-turning thing together.

So we have our different paces. We have our different priorities. He wanted to ride 50 miles. I wanted to be at work by 2 p.m. But like all those couples engaged in a constant struggle between ESPN and The Food Network, we make it work. He turns the volume down a bit, and I pretend that the joys of technical singletrack aren't terribly overrated (After all, we're only riding loops over the footprint of a melting glacier, not traversing the Rocky Mountains.) And as he ever more gently urges me to try cleaning a log I've already nearly endoed over, I'm definitely thinking, "we should do this more often."

Not that we're really that incompatible cycling together. I guess I just think it's funny that we have any differences at all, when we're both overzealous about the exact same thing. It's like sharing the same religion, going to the same church, sitting in the exact same pew, listening to the same sermon, and envisioning two different rewards. He's thinking "Go to Heaven." I'm thinking "Stay out of Hell."

But when we waver long enough to work our way to middle ground, we find ourselves riding together, here.

(I don't know why these pictures are so blown out. I think I'm not the only one overwhelmed by all of this clear-sky sunlight.)

(At first glance, this picture is boring. But I really like the distinct layers of green hues.)