If you ride enough you’ll get confused.

You may wonder where you are, what you’re doing, or even why you are sitting on your scooter or motorcycle at all.  As much as I try to let the common concerns of everyday life behind they show up with the slightest provocation.  Looking at these signs during a stop of a ride last weekend suddenly had me back in my office wrestling with a project that I’m having trouble making a decision.

Intrusive thoughts can lead to interrupted riding — a tarnishing of the escape I hope to make.

It wasn’t until I looked at this photograph later that I wondered what it was trying to say, especially since it was along an ordinary road with no choices to make.

Perhaps it was a hallucination.

Paul Ruby and I were on our way to breakfast in Alexandria, Pennsylvania — a meal served at the Methodist Church as part of Hartslog Day.  Neither of us was familiar with the event nor were prepared for the sudden appearance of thousands of people gathering for a celebration which closed the town to traffic and led to more interrupted riding.

The older I get, the more seriously work to avoid crowds.  Three is a crowd.  We rode past Alexandria with new plans.

In my dreams I spend most of my time riding and absorbing the scenery — a quiet meditative act that allows me to ease into a life that’s less stressful, more intentional.  Whatever that means.

This building is the Huntingdon Furnace Grist Mill which is part of, I think, the Huntingdon Furnace complex between Warriors Mark and Seven Stars.  I wondered how many other men or women have stood where I was looking at the shadows on the stones cast by the morning sun?

Looking at the picture now I can only think of how there’s more interrupted riding — this time due to a sudden flare of an old back injury — one occurring in high school while attempting to become a pole vaulter.

It’s discouraging when things don’t go as planned despite how much I try not to hold onto expectations.  The autumn world is a dazzling time to ride the Vespa.  Our slow meandering path through the dappled colored leaves made the lack of a specific place to eat unimportant.

Sitting here now writing, knowing I can’t ride, knowing even getting out of the chair will involve wincing pain and struggle — it just sucks.

I’ve been here before.  The last time was in 2008.  Before that every five or six years since the pole vaulting nonsense some insignificant event would trigger a debilitating situation.  Decades ago it became known as Saab Battery Disease — the result of pulling the battery from my 1969 Saab 99.  Years latter it was a pair of wet jeans pulled from the washing machine.  This time it was sitting in a chair at dog class for Lily.

Interrupted riding plans.

On the second day of chiropractic care I was sent for an x-ray of my spine just to confirm radiographically that my ankylosing spondylitis hasn’t escaped the grasp of my current medications and this is still just pole vaulting interrupting riding plans.

I would be pissed if this current situation is spondylitis related.  Would make the whole “not retiring yet” seem wrongheaded.

Mostly, I’m frustrated that I can’t ride.  Getting the Vespa on and off the centerstand would be a nightmare.

Paul and I eventually found a place to eat but not until bypassing two Hartslog Day choices and one out of business hole in the wall establishment.  We ended up at Top’s Diner along US Route 22 between Mount Union and Huntingdon.  The place was crowded with Penn State fans on their way to the football game but well worth the wait for breakfast.

When we left home the temperature was 46F — chilly by any measure but mitigated greatly by the sunshine.  Leaving the diner it was nearly 60F which is near perfect riding weather in my book.

The ride home is often discouraging — the entire time you know something you love is ending.  I hate that melancholy feeling.  Maybe it’s because I’ve not exhausted my riding lust.  It must be how my dogs feel when we head home before they’ve tired of chasing the tennis ball or swimming in the pond.

I’d happily take on that melancholy feeling right now in exchange for the nagging back pain.  An hour ago I almost collapsed in the street as I tried to shuffle quickly ahead of oncoming cars.  And almost anything that falls to the ground stays there.  Retrieval means and complex process of descent and hands and knees work before calling upon my best MacGyver skills to get myself back up.  And both directions involve cursing and cringing.

Someone once told me that “life sucks and then you die.”

Life is great right now.  Really great.