“After being bombarded endlessly by road-safety propaganda it was almost a relief to find myself in an actual accident.” ― J.G. Ballard, Crash
Scene of a crash. That heavy metal bollard – put in to protect the brick signpost – was bent. Somebody hit the thing hard.
I futzed and dutzed around today and didn’t get out for my daily bike ride until the brutal heat of the afternoon. It wasn’t too bad, though, I took some ice and water and at least on a bike you make your own breeze.
I found the bike trail blocked at Larkspur and Plano roads. Someone had hit a protective bollard, bending it more than a bit, and knocked the stop sign/street sign over. There was broken glass everywhere, though the car(s) involved were long towed away. I cut through a church parking lot and rode some residential streets to avoid the broken glass and bent steel.
“I love the smell of book ink in the morning.” ― Umberto Eco
Stuff on a picnic table in Huffhines Park, Richardson Texas.
Day two of the rest of my life. I didn’t get up as early as I liked – but I did pack up my bike and hit the road by 8 AM. Today I decided simply to loop around through the square mile of the Duck Creek Neighborhood – and get my five miles in that way.
I stopped five miles in and grabbed a table under the trees in Huffhines Park (not far at all from where I live). After my ride yesterday I added a pair of Bluetooth earbuds, a notebook, reading glasses, and a Kaweco Sport fountain pen – so I could sit, listen to music, drink my thermos of coffee, and write a bit.
It was so nice. A large group was playing cricket in the outfield of the softball diamond. I remembered when I was at a meeting with the Richardson Park Department at the Huffhines Recreational Center (right across the little pond from where I sat today) I recommended the city put in a proper cricket pitch on some vacant parkland across Plano road. They looked at me like I had lost my mind – but I stand by my idea.
I watched a large bug climbing the tree next to me. Huge, black, full of odd angles and jagged bits (I guess to make him look unappealing to predators) he used his surprisingly delicate legs to find his way up the rough park towards the distant leaves.
The squirrels chattered by, one hauling a half of an Osage Orange fruit up a tree.
There is a constant parade of walkers – most with dogs – going by on the jogging trail. A mother with her young daughter strolled by – the daughter was blind, feeling ahead with her white-tipped cane, but with confident strides holding her mother’s hand.
And I finished my coffee – I let the song come to an end and packed it all up. I put in another five miles – I need to drink my coffee sooner – it gave me a burst of energy, I felt faster and the pavement rolled by easier.
“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”
― Rumi
Clarence Street Art Collective, The Cedars, Dallas, Texas
I remember back in high school during an assembly when the principal came out – he was an old, clueless, asshole who was gone within a year – stepped up to the microphone and said, “Today is the first day of the rest of your life.” There was an immediate deafening groan. The idiot had read this somewhere and thought he was the first one to discover the saying. He must never have looked at a poster (this was, of course, decades before the internet and tacky posters were the communication method of spreading memes) and ignorant that the phrase he uttered was five years’ worn out. I almost felt sorry for the old fool… no, not really.
But today was, really, the first day of the rest of my life. After almost a half-century of going to work every single day, I retired. I turned in my work phone, my laptop, and my security badge and walked out to my car.
It’s an incredibly strange feeling – like something huge that used to be right there, all the time, and now is gone forever. I woke up this morning and instinctively reached for my work phone to see what disasters had occurred overnight that I would have to deal with… and found the charger empty.
So what was the first thing I did post-work? I’m sure you will not be surprised to read that I crawled out of bed at dawn, made a thermos of fresh ground coffee, and went for a long bike ride. It felt so good not having any time pressure. Even on Saturdays, when I was working, I would feel the pressure of upcoming Monday. And now Monday is just another day.
I stopped at one of my usual places and sat there and leisurely drank my coffee. I think I’ll do this every day. Actually, I thought about putting a list out somewhere with times and places I plan to have coffee, call it “East Richardson morning bike and coffee” or something and see if anyone ever wants to meet me and share a cup of Joe. Is that a good idea? It seems sort of weird, but it would be fun. Have to think about it.
“Louisiana in September was like an obscene phone call from nature. The air – moist, sultry, secretive, and far from fresh – felt as if it were being exhaled into one’s face. Sometimes it even sounded like heavy breathing.”
And now the temperature has climbed into the triple digits (102 Fahrenheit today – in Centigrade that’s… too damn hot) making it a real challenge.
I was up before six this morning and ready to go at six-thirty, as the sun was barely rising. That was actually pretty nice – not too hot – not too much wind – not a lot of traffic – at that ungodly time of morning. I carry a change of clothes in a garment folder and change into my business attire once I’ve sat at my desk long enough to stop sweating.
The trip home was a beating. It wasn’t so much the heat – I was worn out – I’m too old for this – and the south wind was strong and hot. There was some unexpected construction along my route and that added another mile to the ride.
When I made it home I was exhausted. So I’ll leave all you fine folks and go off to sleep now.
“Every Rejection, Every Disappointment Has Led You Here To This Moment”
— Alpha Waymond, Everything Everywhere All at Once
My bicycle locked up in front of The Alamo Drafthouse theater in Richardson, Texas. They have the coolest bike racks.
Partly out of desire… but mostly out of necessity (we are down to one working car) I have been riding the five mile commute to my work on my bike every day. The mornings are OK – except I have to get up twenty minutes before dawn so I’m riding before it gets too hot – the rising sun slowly burning away the morning fog. The afternoon commute is already too hot, though – here in Texas it’s already in the mid to high nineties most days.
There was a movie I’ve been wanting to see – Everything Everywhere All at Once. It was showing at the Alamo Drafthouse here in Richardson at 6:15. My commute is five miles, it’s three or so miles to the theater, and four and a half home from there. Easy riding – except for the heavy rush hour traffic around downtown Richardson and coming off Highway 75. So I sneaked out of work a few minutes early and rode up to the Alamo.
It was hot and I was sweating like a stuck pig. A bit embarrassing, but I arrived a bit early so I bought a cold beer (Lakewood Temptress on tap) and sat in a dark booth in the back of the cool bar until the movie was announced… I was able to cool and dry off enough to at least be almost presentable.
The movie is getting a lot of hype —- and it deserves every bit of it… and more. It is not a perfect film – it is way too ambitious for that – and when the filmmakers have a chance to go for it… the do that and more.
I can’t really explain the plot. It’s the story of a middle aged Chinese woman named Evelyn (played by the incredibly talented Michelle Yeoh) and her immigrant family (with a very American lesbian daughter) that lives in a tiny apartment over their failing laundromat. They are straining with family drama and friction and are about to undergo an IRS audit. At that point Evelyn discovers that there is an infinite multiverse made up of all the different realities that each person has created with every decision they make. Not only that, but there is an evil creature named Jobu Tupaki that is jumping through the multiverse, destroying everything. Jobu makes Thanos look like a piker. Evelyn, this failing version of Evelyn, this worst of all possible Evelyns, is the only person that can stop this.
She is torn between saving all the universes and trying to complete her IRS audit. Things get strange after that.
This is not a sufficient explanation of the plot or an adequate description of what the movie feels like – those things are impossible. You have to see it to believe it.
Boiled down – it’s the eternal struggle between the googly eye and the everything bagel (really). You have to see it to understand.
Just see it.
I want to see it again. It is so complex, layered, with so many references and symbols – one viewing is not enough (maybe a hundred wouldn’t be enough). Plus, it is a movie with a heart – a giant beating, sometimes bloody heart. It’s really funny too.
Oh, see it in a theater. I can’t imagine watching it for the first time at home, alone.
It was dark when the movie was over, but I have good lights, the traffic had died down, and my ride home was uneventful (and maybe a little fun).
I slept like a stone – dreaming of people with hot dog fingers and sentient stones.
“Every time I hear a political speech or I read those of our leaders, I am horrified at having, for years, heard nothing which sounded human. It is always the same words telling the same lies. And the fact that men accept this, that the people’s anger has not destroyed these hollow clowns, strikes me as proof that men attribute no importance to the way they are governed; that they gamble—yes, gamble—with a whole part of their life and their so called “vital interest.” ― Albert Camus, Notebooks 1935-1942
Last weekend I made some coffee, grabbed my notebook and pens, and took off on my bicycle to find a place to write up my three pages – I have been scribbling the morning pages from Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. This last Saturday, a week later, I wanted to do the same thing. My son wanted to go to this new coffee shop Staycation – here in downtown Richardson and he offered to ride along with me. Sounds like a good idea. Nice morning ride – we left at 7:30 so we would get there before it opened. It turned out to be a hair over three miles – and very pleasant because there is no traffic at that hour of a Saturday and the air was still cool enough.
Staycation is a great coffee shop. The owner, Nichole Gregory, took a 1940’s cottage left in the middle of downtown Richardson and modified it into a very pleasant and comfortable place to grab a cup of Joe. I can’t recommend it higher.
After we had our coffee, Nick rode home – but I still wanted to put a few more miles in and I still wanted to stop and write (Yes, I could have written in the coffee shop – but I wanted to try something else). So I went up the Central Trail, then down the Collins Bike Lane, to the Duck Creek Extension trail across Arapaho. Thinking about a place to stop and write (there are a lot of benches… but surprisingly few tables), I remembered about a concrete bench that was stuck incongruously in the middle of a traffic circle at American Parkway and Presidential Drive – I ride my bike past there every now and then when trying to build up mileage. It’s a light commercial area – and would be deserted on a Saturday so I decided to go there… and it worked well.
My pens and looseleaf notebook (Morning pages) on the concrete bench in the traffic circle at Presidential and American, Richardson, Texas.
I wrote my pages – packed up and wandered around the ‘hood until I had my ten miles for the day. Made it home before eleven AM – a good start to the day.
“Always carry a notebook. And I mean always. The short-term memory only retains information for three minutes; unless it is committed to paper you can lose an idea for ever.”
― Will Self
I meant to get up early – and didn’t really… but didn’t sleep too late. I ground some extra beans and made a thermos of coffee with my Aeropress. My portable Aeropress Go and hand grinder are on my desk at work – or I might have simply filled the thermos with hot water and made the stuff fresh – but the few minutes it sits in the steel vacuum vessel won’t hurt the taste much.
I packed up my loose-leaf binder notebook and selected four pens. Recently I bought some pen holders (brand name Diodrio) that fit on interchangeable stretchy Velcro straps – and they have been very useful to me. The straps come in several sizes so the pens can be attached to any notebook, from a small Moleskine to a big loose leaf. This is truly the best of all possible worlds.
Diodrio Pen Pouch – on my the loose-leaf notebook I use for morning pages. It comes with interchangeable Velcro straps to fit smaller notebooks.
I have been trying out the idea of morning pages from Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. Every day, I had write three pages in the notebook – about whatever comes to mind. She recommends never re-reading them, and even destroying the writing after each day. I don’t do that – there may be some useful ideas in there so I am keeping them… at least for a while.
The idea is to write in the morning, immediately upon rising. That doesn’t work for me – there are too many emergencies and interruptions starting as soon as I open my eyes. I have been able to finish the pages (one important aspect is to write the three sheets every day, without fail) daily, but sometimes haven’t finished them until late at night.
It’s actually easy for me to do the writing – I’ve been writing daily for at least three decades, after all – but I like the aspect of handwriting (it slows me down a bit – and gives me a chance to use my beloved fountain pens) and the idea of writing with no preconceptions.
One thing I also enjoy is writing in different places. So today I decided to pack up my bike with some coffee, my notebook, and ride to some place to get in the scribbling and caffeinate myself at the same time. It looked like some rain – so after about five miles of riding I settled in at a little pocket park with a roofed picnic area. Collins Park – at Alma and Collins – I have stopped there before – and have met other riders there for pre-work coffee. It’s nice, has a power outlet, a drinking fountain, and a bike rack (that I never use). I pulled in just in time, as the rain started coming down – not too bad – little more than a stout Texas sprinkle.
My bike, in a little pocket park I like to stop at. Collins Park – at Collins and Alma, in Richardson, Texas.
Some coffee and my notebook – stopping on a bike ride to write a few pages. The pen is a Pilot Kakuno with a stub nib – Diamine Marine ink.
So I put my earbuds in, started a Spotify playlist on my phone, and wrote my morning pages.
Then I pulled out a folding Bluetooth keyboard and wrote this entry on my phone. It worked pretty well – a morning with a bicycle, coffee, fountain pens, and some extra blog writing. Yes, this is truly the best of all possible worlds.
“What could I say? Maybe this: the man hunched over his motorcycle can focus only on the present instant of his flight; he is caught in a fragment of time cut off from both the past and the future; he is wrenched from the continuity of time; he is outside time; in other words, he is in a state of ecstasy; in that state he is unaware of his age, his wife, his children, his worries, and so he has no fear, because the source of fear is in the future, and a person freed of the future has nothing to fear.”
“The degree of slowness is directionally proportional to the intensity of memory. The degree of speed is directionally proportional to the intensity of forgetting.”
― Milan Kundera, Slowness
bicycle drag race, Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge, Dallas, Texas
“I delve into the mysterious and counterintuitive world of helmets and high-visibility gear later in the book. But it’s worth immediately noting this: while they’re not inherently bad, they’re less a safety device for cycling than a symptom of a road network where no cyclist can truly feel safe.” ― Peter Walker, How Cycling Can Save the World
Nice Tribe Urban Bike parked outside Braindead Brewing, Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas
Let’s see when it was…. May 9, 2021 (well under a year ago) when I went down to the groundbreaking of the Northaven Trail Bridge. It’s exciting – a bridge system that goes over the giant deadly Hway75 North Central Expressway and also White Rock Creek. It will join the Northaven trail with the White Rock and Cottonwood Trails – East and West will come together, opening up a whole new galaxy of bicycle riding in the Metroplex.
Here’s a virtual simulation of the thing:
Whenever I drive down Central or ride down the White Rock Trail I look at the construction. Although the signature bridge is still a long time off – the progress is palpable. It truly is the best of all possible worlds.
Here’s drone footage of what it looks like right now:
Bill Chance 