Isn't It Ironic...

"Well, life has a funny way of sneakin' up on you when you think

everything's okay and everything's going right; And life has a funny

way nobody helpin' you out and everything blows up in your face..." "Ironic" (Morisette/Ballard, 1995)

Most of my family knows my struggle with the religious/faith issue. It's not that I'm opposed to it. I lost faith more in my fellow religionists than I did in the scriptural texts which most faiths report to follow. My father-in-law & I probably have more in common that I care to admit, except that he still maintains his faith. Mine, on the other hand, is more than a little bit in need of preventative maintenance.

The nice thing is there are situations which remind me of the presence of a divine creator, their handiwork, & the need to appreciate both. That's where the long(er) bike rides definitely serve their purpose.

I had no intention whatsoever to do anything on Sunday morning, save for drink coffee & engage in mindless reading...which for me means history books or memoirs. However, my friends graciously invited me to go ride with them along the southern Alabama coast, from Orange Beach (Sportsplex was the starting point, below) to Fort Morgan & back. Since my loving wife is out of country, it made perfect sense to keep myself occupied.

Since I didn't run on Saturday morning (worked a 5K on the beach) or afternoon (100-plus degree heat index) I figured the "missed" workout could be made up for by a nice, leisurely ride. Well, the plan was to go leisurely. We were close enough to leisurely for a good portion of it.

Ah, but I digress. Probably the first five miles or so of the ride, & another five after that, was mostly on winding bike paths. Okay, if you're training for a triathlon it's probably going to be a little too technical for the speeds you want to be going, or it will reinforce the need for a comfortable pace. Nice thing about the vast majority of these bike paths was the fact they were tree-lined; the first five was almost completely tree-shaded. So we weren't hammering or anything...definitely enjoying the conditions on the way out. However, I have to admit the heat became quite oppressive on the return trip & no amount of shade was of benefit.

The bridge below was on the first/last miles of the trail...all I could hear in the back of my mind was Phil Keaggy's March of the Clouds. Almost a meditative state for the earliest part of the ride. I guess that is the nicest thing about bicycling. You can put in enough of an effort to feel good about yourself, yet you're not beating yourself up. If you are on a scenic road you might see one or more cool things, nature-wise.

Go off the front for the occasional ten-minute solo pace push & you almost can hear yourself think...of course, as long as your heart rate is low enough you don't hear all that pounding. You get to see stuff at a pace you would never have noticed in an automobile. We were pleased the terns decided to leave us be yesterday morning; the ones around Pensacola Beach are a lot more aggressive than the ones in Alabama. During the brief mid-point stop at Fort Morgan (at the ferry to Dauphin Island) we saw a few dolphins moving through the water. Sometimes the reminders are subtle, y'know?

I had the opportunity to watch a video about three triathletes & their preparation for 2008 Ironman Wisconsin, titled The Distance. Steve suggested I watch it (we'll have to sit down and play it for Suzanne); I was worried at first he wanted to drop some bad news my way with it. However, watching these normal, ordinary people prepare for the same thing I was doing now was pretty entertaining. When you saw them registering for the next years' event even before they had accomplished this years' goal, I realized the very message my friend Christian has tried to remind me: 'it's the journey, not the destination, that's important.'

It's easy to get hung up in the minutiae of training. Steve & I have compared notes over the past weeks; he has a slightly different perspective than I about the training. He's using a heart rate monitor & GPS & high-tech stuff...I'm a little more low-tech, using a heart rate monitor for some workouts (I'm used to working out via perceived effort), a few reference spreadsheets for others, tracking my efforts via another spreadsheet. He's set a specific time goal (well, he has a wager with his wife); all I want to do is finish.

Same journey, same destination.

At the Sportsplex in Orange Beach (and in most every city in Alabama I've visited) the facility looks top-notch. The soccer fields were in fantastic condition; with grass which cries out for you to take off your shoes & run in it (which I think Beverly did after our ride), decent bathrooms, concession facilities, & so on. I asked myself why Pensacola couldn't have something that nice; why was it we had to literally drive an hour into another state to get a good training ride, where we didn't have to worry about broken beer bottles (okay, there was one place near the end of the ride where I saw a lot of broken glass, but...) getting cut off or hassled?

Maybe Alabama cities realize good parks & good recreational facilities are what keep families living there. I realize it takes tax money to run this stuff, & you have to have dedicated maintenance employees, but I don't think you can place a price tag on quality of life stuff.

It only seemed ironic that the local newspaper's headline this morning was City's Parades In Peril. The city council has decided it cannot afford to pay for the city workers to put up/take down barriers, the police to re-direct the traffic, sanitation to clean up afterward, etc. etc. etc., all the stuff having to do with the countless parades here. When it was local road races taking the hit for police coverage the general population did not seem all that sympathetic.

Hm...maybe that's why OB can get Steely Dan, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, etc., to come do concerts & Pensacola gets...monster trucks.