Streaming bolts of light rays, burn through the morning clouds and
the sun rises like a fiery pink ball being hoisted across the horizon. It
promises to be another blazing day of high temperatures. But right now I’m just
thankful that I was up and moving before the light and drove to where the bike trail
climbs in a wide ribbon to the north.
My muscles and tendons strain and burn slightly as each foot
pushes down, one and then the other, every thrust causing momentum to build. I
don’t even put in earphones and music, because I want to hear every sound
around me. Such as the crunch that small rocks make as the tires roll over the
concrete, the birds, and the rhythm of my own breathing.
The air is thick with the smell of the fresh mowed alfalfa in
the field next to me. A hawk sits on top of his grassy round-bale sentinel, intently looking
for his next snack. The air is laced with the familiar sweet scent of cottonwoods
that line the river valley and is carried along with the heavy morning humidity.
I’m not riding to train for a race or travel across the
state for a cause, though certainly I admire those who do. For me there is no performance
or posturing. No stop watch or rank.
I just ride.
I ride because it makes me feel relaxed, stronger and more
alive.
Riding my bike, actually changes my perspective.
It’s like shooting high pressured air into my tires, only its endorphins into
tired veins with each deep breath and revolution of the wheel.
One of the most vivid memories I have
of childhood, is me, pedaling as fast as my short legs could spin, blonde pigtails
flying, racing my bother down the long narrow lane from our country home.
We always had a bike. Honestly, it was one of our great luxuries,
since it was our ticket to neighborhood games of baseball, the nearby creek,
and frequent trips to city swimming pool, just over the river bridge.
The bike was my freedom, my ticket to exploration, childhood status symbol and I would use it to escape whenever things were tense at home.
In those days my bike had one speed. No gears to shift. Just ride at your own pace, which was usually
as fast as legs could make pedals spin.
And didn't those childhood days spiral into the past, faster
than we could have ever understood?
Then as a young mom, yelling and stressed out in the four
walls of my fear and darkness, the bicycle would help me breathe. In and out.
Heart pumping. Feet spinning. Birds
singing and people waving. The whining blond haired cherubs, would begin to giggle, laugh and
wave like small queens.
It was such a great escape.
This is one of the things that helped me back onto the path
of living and getting on with life.
Just a few years ago, after surgery and treatment with
breast cancer, I was in a new season that needed some fresh energy and life.
I still had my decade’s old, mountain bike. But, my friend
Patty, who has a heart as big as the rolling sandhills I leave near, and loves to see people and bicycles connect, she talked
me into a beautiful new “pink” road bike to commemorate the new phase of life.
It goes faster than I need it too.
People who do triathlons like to borrow it.
This bike has so many gears that my friend has placed a
graph of how to shift on the frame.
Not that I really understand it.
I do know, that when pedaling gets hard, I shift. When it
gets too easy I adjust the gears with a few clicks the other direction. And
when the rhythm is completely off, I can push both hand gears to the center and
the chain slides back to a neutral position and I can start over again. Click,
click, click.
Some days I feel like that is how my life is.
So many things going.
So many levels of involvement and commitments.
So many good things vying for my time, resources and energy.
When I lose momentum, I have to take a speed-check of all
that is going on and get back to the basics.
I can realign my direction and regain
focus for the next step I need to take on the path, as I work through the levels of my life. I do this by time spent in the Word and putting my focus back on Jesus.
And it is a heart-pounding, breath-taking ride.
In the past I've taken so many dead-end paths.
I've used a bike to escape, to gain a sense of freedom, to find a pulse in the center of a bruised and broken life. In the most true sense, I spent years spinning my wheels, trying to find my identity in so many things.
All along, my identity was Beloved.
All along, my identity was Beloved.
Now I mostly use the bike for the pure thrill of the ride and
to enjoy the wonder around me.
This one blazing heart of mine, the one that has spent most
of my life looking for unconditional love and true freedom, really feels most alive when
the wind is pressing against my face, my lungs are heaving with fresh air, and adrenaline is infused throughout my whole person.
I love to live with this kind of passion.
I want to run my life race like that. Flat out. Fully engaged. Heart pumping. Lungs burning from the workout.
I'm grateful that a bike helped change my perspective, many time through different seasons.
And now, I’m a bike-riding, Message-carrier.
I carry the timeless, forever message of Hope, of Faith
and of True Love.
And someday there will be a finish line.
I'm not sure if bicycles will be in glory, but there is a reward.
Therefore, since we are surrounded
by such a huge crowd of witnesses
to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight
that slows us down, especially the sin
that so easily hinders our progress.
And let us run with endurance
the race that God has set before us.
We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus,
on whom our faith depends from start to finish.
He was willing to die a shameful death on the cross
because of the joy he knew would be his afterward.
Now he is seated in the place of highest honor
beside God's throne in heaven.
Hebrews 12:1-2
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