I am sitting on a plane traveling from San Francisco to Seattle, final destination being Spokane, and I just realized how much I miss the snow. I haven’t even touched it yet and my desire to sit at the top of a mountain and just be is taking me. I am looking down from the sky above and all I see is snow covered peak after snow covered peak. I have been avoiding this all season. I have not any thought of travel up into the mountains, just miles from where I live, for the fear of this moment. How do I go fourth? How do I harness this desire and stay focused? All of these answers elude me.
I miss the regiment of early morning preparations to go train, the freedom, the exhilaration, the team, and believe or not the cold. There was a flow to how it all was and I have been in that flow for the last 20 years then by choice I stopped. I fully enveloped myself in cycling, life, and friends, but now that I am staring at my life time passion what do I do? Is this like an recovering alcoholic driving by the Liquor Discount Store that is the size of Texas and not plowing straight through the front door?
I know that next couple of months are going to pass in a whirlwind with multiple trips to California in preparation for the World Championships but at the same time how much will skiing have ahold of me? Out of sight out of mind? Easy to say about keys, or chores, or daily living, but what about an entire way of living? Does out of sight out mind work? All of these questions are going to be faced. Facing my challenges is the one character flaw about myself that I like because I am going to hit it head first and straight on. Why skirt around the edges? I want to know how to handle it and where to go next. Will these revelation change my future goals, probably not but it will help me understand who I am. For now I stay my course and train my little butt off through Worlds and then hold on to the reins as the season continues all the way through November.
I do enjoy the cycling team, we get together and work as one, train as one, and win as a whole. If one person has a bad day the team knows and always tries to support one another and at the same moment if one has a breakthrough the team congratulates all the same. In skiing I was surrounded by that everyday, even off days chilling with teammates. I do miss that.
All in all I think that this is a good way to realize that this major change will not ruin me but allow me to grow and understand more if life. There are going to be many more changes in my life and this one challenge is going to be a minor one compared to what still has in store, well at least I hope so otherwise I might get bored.
