I heard that Calgary had some snow this week, and the night time temps are dropping below zero already. Where has the year gone...
Remember when you were a kid? I do. Changing the date of my birthday on my student card, two years older, 15 when I was only 13. Fibbing to girls that were in high school while still taking shop at Wellington Jr. I thought I was believable, why? Because I had a bike, I was mobile. Most of my generation was still relying on parents to transport them, and in the days prior to multiple family cars, many of my peers were restricted to bicycles, Edmonton transit and yes, the dreaded foot-mobile. In retrospect, not such a bad thing, we were fit and healthy for our PT classes.
But I had a bike, I was mobile, I could ride across the city to the Children's (Story Land Valley Zoo) or all the way out to Elk Island National Park to the east or Lake Wabamun in the west. I could take a passenger (read girl) on the back of my Honda S 90 or Suzuki A100 street scrambler, and later as I matured, my Suzuki X6 Hustler.
By the time I was in high school, guys were getting old cars to drive, and the girls preferred to ride along with them. No matter, there was always a chick that went apart from the crowd, that wanted to feel the rush of air tearing at their arms as the bike came close to the 90 mph mark. The bikes I rode in my youth couldn't make the "ton." That would come later.
As we get older, I feel in many ways we move backwards in time. Responsibility, credit/debt, growth, experience, relationships, a little more growth. Marriage in some cases, in others divorce. Bigger homes, cars, family-mobiles, bigger bikes with windshields, fairings then factory windshields and fairings. Sound systems, yet larger engines, more weight, maybe another marriage and another divorce.
All seems so complicated don't it?!
The simplest things in life, the little joys are oft times lost or in some cases... never had.
Here I am, been to far off places, was married and was divorced. Pushing 60 yoa and glad for the youth, not that which has been long lost but the youth that comes from experiences, the constant pushing of the envelope* of having had the experiences, the heartache, the heart attacks, the knowing that you have lived to tell the tale as I am doing right now. The grateful youth of time.
It's Thanks Giving weekend. Little Phoenix who has grown up, is rubbing against my jeans, tail curling this way and that. Holly and Kevin came over from their studies in Halifax to join us first for dinner and today over at her Mother's family. Brenda and I with Anna in tow, drove the length of County Line road 6km to the north shore to explore the beach. Like those Lava Life ads, all those lonely people wishing for the long walk on the beach... we were doing the long walk on the beach.
The Gulf of St Lawrence where sailing ships once sailed, where U Boats prowled and sank merchant ships, where waves have endlessly rolled onto the sandy shores of this red Island, we walked and talked. A nice fall day, 14C, sunny and bright with a breeze billowing our jackets slightly.
Yes there is still plenty of stress associated with the build, yes I still have a home in Calgary to sell, yes, money can be tight, yes there are always pressures endlessly rolling across our lives like the warmest water north of the Caribbean.
Still, I am grateful and thankful for my life, what it's meant, how I've lived (most of) it.
Yesterday, as I ride my dirt bike around my little grass track, Kevin snapping photos and Holly shooting some video, turkey dinner done like turkey, coffee and pie safe in my belly, them telling the story of their past year, I yet again come to the conclusion that the important things in this life are not the big house, leather buckets and quadrophonic stereo sound, big screen televisions or silicone breasts; but the simplest pleasures of sharing time, doing what you choose to do, appreciating family, friends and riding a little blue dirt bike around a grass track.
I spent a couple of hours with Mike Smith today after our beach foray, going over the techniques of riding that I used to teach to hundreds of others over the years across the sands and indeed the seas of time. Mike says to me, "I think I should maybe sell the bike, maybe I can't do this..." or words to that effect and I realize once again that we are all unique, different yet all the same, because what Mike lacks is not intelligence, he's plenty smart... it's not money, although we could all use some more right, it's not even motivation... after all he's been talking incessantly to me over the last 30 years since I first taught him to ride... it's faith.
After all, riding a motorcycle in nothing really all that different from driving a car, or flying an aircraft, or learning to swim. There is no magic (that comes later) it's just paying attention, learning the skills, perfecting them everyday and giving it the old college try. Then repeating over and over.
So... Happy Thanksgiving to all. Be grateful, even for the shit, because only by living through that, will you realize the life can indeed by sweet.
*Pushing the envelope comes from test pilots in the early days being handed the day's requirements for testing the latest machine. Often they would go beyond the what was expected, hence... pushing the envelope.
Remember when you were a kid? I do. Changing the date of my birthday on my student card, two years older, 15 when I was only 13. Fibbing to girls that were in high school while still taking shop at Wellington Jr. I thought I was believable, why? Because I had a bike, I was mobile. Most of my generation was still relying on parents to transport them, and in the days prior to multiple family cars, many of my peers were restricted to bicycles, Edmonton transit and yes, the dreaded foot-mobile. In retrospect, not such a bad thing, we were fit and healthy for our PT classes.
But I had a bike, I was mobile, I could ride across the city to the Children's (Story Land Valley Zoo) or all the way out to Elk Island National Park to the east or Lake Wabamun in the west. I could take a passenger (read girl) on the back of my Honda S 90 or Suzuki A100 street scrambler, and later as I matured, my Suzuki X6 Hustler.
By the time I was in high school, guys were getting old cars to drive, and the girls preferred to ride along with them. No matter, there was always a chick that went apart from the crowd, that wanted to feel the rush of air tearing at their arms as the bike came close to the 90 mph mark. The bikes I rode in my youth couldn't make the "ton." That would come later.
As we get older, I feel in many ways we move backwards in time. Responsibility, credit/debt, growth, experience, relationships, a little more growth. Marriage in some cases, in others divorce. Bigger homes, cars, family-mobiles, bigger bikes with windshields, fairings then factory windshields and fairings. Sound systems, yet larger engines, more weight, maybe another marriage and another divorce.
All seems so complicated don't it?!
The simplest things in life, the little joys are oft times lost or in some cases... never had.
Here I am, been to far off places, was married and was divorced. Pushing 60 yoa and glad for the youth, not that which has been long lost but the youth that comes from experiences, the constant pushing of the envelope* of having had the experiences, the heartache, the heart attacks, the knowing that you have lived to tell the tale as I am doing right now. The grateful youth of time.
It's Thanks Giving weekend. Little Phoenix who has grown up, is rubbing against my jeans, tail curling this way and that. Holly and Kevin came over from their studies in Halifax to join us first for dinner and today over at her Mother's family. Brenda and I with Anna in tow, drove the length of County Line road 6km to the north shore to explore the beach. Like those Lava Life ads, all those lonely people wishing for the long walk on the beach... we were doing the long walk on the beach.
The Gulf of St Lawrence where sailing ships once sailed, where U Boats prowled and sank merchant ships, where waves have endlessly rolled onto the sandy shores of this red Island, we walked and talked. A nice fall day, 14C, sunny and bright with a breeze billowing our jackets slightly.
Yes there is still plenty of stress associated with the build, yes I still have a home in Calgary to sell, yes, money can be tight, yes there are always pressures endlessly rolling across our lives like the warmest water north of the Caribbean.
Still, I am grateful and thankful for my life, what it's meant, how I've lived (most of) it.
Yesterday, as I ride my dirt bike around my little grass track, Kevin snapping photos and Holly shooting some video, turkey dinner done like turkey, coffee and pie safe in my belly, them telling the story of their past year, I yet again come to the conclusion that the important things in this life are not the big house, leather buckets and quadrophonic stereo sound, big screen televisions or silicone breasts; but the simplest pleasures of sharing time, doing what you choose to do, appreciating family, friends and riding a little blue dirt bike around a grass track.
I spent a couple of hours with Mike Smith today after our beach foray, going over the techniques of riding that I used to teach to hundreds of others over the years across the sands and indeed the seas of time. Mike says to me, "I think I should maybe sell the bike, maybe I can't do this..." or words to that effect and I realize once again that we are all unique, different yet all the same, because what Mike lacks is not intelligence, he's plenty smart... it's not money, although we could all use some more right, it's not even motivation... after all he's been talking incessantly to me over the last 30 years since I first taught him to ride... it's faith.
After all, riding a motorcycle in nothing really all that different from driving a car, or flying an aircraft, or learning to swim. There is no magic (that comes later) it's just paying attention, learning the skills, perfecting them everyday and giving it the old college try. Then repeating over and over.
So... Happy Thanksgiving to all. Be grateful, even for the shit, because only by living through that, will you realize the life can indeed by sweet.
*Pushing the envelope comes from test pilots in the early days being handed the day's requirements for testing the latest machine. Often they would go beyond the what was expected, hence... pushing the envelope.
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