Archive for May, 2010

May 31: Memorial Day

Cause you can’t get this anywhere else.

May 30: The Secret

They’ve repaved Kanan Dume Road from south of the second tunnel all the way to the PCH. A long morning’s climb is rewarded with smooth unmarked black asphalt – a ribbon of darkness that stretches out for miles at a negative 8 percent grade. I click the crank into the big ring and run through the cassette until the rear derailleur doesn’t have any place left to go.

My thighs squeeze and Big Jim pulls like a freight train.

It’s an easy Sunday morning ride and I don’t have much weight in the bags, just enough to give gravity a little help sucking me down a great big hill. I pass 30 then 35 miles an hour. Hover at 38 through a flat spot in the road.

Cyclists climbing the grade on the northbound side wave at me and I nod through the wind driven wetness of my eyes head tucked low, pedaling faster into the rare gift of a long smooth downhill, gentle curves, and light traffic.

A surfboard laden truck passes slowly on my left; relative speed keeping us close as we wind down into the canyon. The passenger yells something unintelligible at me and flashes a thumbs up out the window. I glance down at the computer just as I pass 40mph.

I laugh out loud and feel the world suck me down the last big hill to the beach before slowly adding some brake, and as I pull up at the light at the bottom notice a couple standing outside a store. They smile at my wind-tear streaked face and I smile back. I check the computer – 42.3 mph max speed.

“Hell of a hill isn’t it?” I ask
and they smile and nod. “The best,” says the man.

Then the light changes and me and Big Jim roll with the traffic back up the road to civilization. No one knows my secret.

No one knows I can fly.

May 29: Hindsight

Maybe I shouldn’t have had that second burrito.

May 28: Jack the Cat

Happy Memorial-Day weekend. Pass the burgers and potato salad please. NOW.

May 27: Be Inspired: Salton Sea, California

Many times the difference between inspiration and disappointment lies in whether we approach a place seeing what we expect, or simply expecting to see.

There is always something to see.

May 26: Josh and Diana | Salton Sea, California

Josh and Diana are engaged to be married on May 28, 2011. The future is always beginning again.

May 25: Red Stairs

May 24: Under the House

The ocean is restless. I hear it banging around below me, so I grab my camera and go under the house to take its picture and tell it to relax.

The beach booms back and throws rocks at the pilings.

The calendar claims that I have twenty-three days before the adventure begins, but to me it began weeks ago and I’m just waiting to get to the next place. I’m restless too.

I sit on the wet stairs to the sand while the sun gets lower in the sky and take pictures of the sea and the wood and the sand. I set the camera for longer exposures to calm the ocean and watch the world around me. I shoot for 30 minutes a variety of exposures and views then I go back upstairs and looks at the shots. Some of them are calm and soft and wispy, while others are more turbulent and unsettled – closer to the reality of the evening.

I leave most of the wispy ones in the well and pick out a few of the more ragged shots.

I am rarely wispy or beautiful. I fight against things I have no control over. I throw stones at the foundations of my life. I am restless and even when I am calm a part of me is always in motion.

The calendar says my next adventure begins in twenty-three days, but the reality of it is that I never really finished the last one. I probably never will. Let’s go.

May 23: Porch Light

Do you remember what I told you on March 20th?

-

May 22: How to Look Like a Jackass While (not) Riding your Bike

It only take a second to look like a complete jackass.

Stopped beside the beach bike path in Ventura, one foot resting on a log that borders the path, the other one still clipped into the pedal, I sit on my bike and check my maps. Its windy and the wind is pushing the bike around a little bit, but I’ll only be stopped for a moment.

I take a long drink of water, pull out the ACA map and boot up Google maps on my phone. I’m 45 miles into the ride and feeling good. I’m on schedule – I’ll make it in good time if I can figure out this next stretch of semi-secret bike path/freeway riding.

The breeze is steady as it pushes against me and I balance the bike without thinking about it engrossed in the maps. I don’t even notice when it changes direction, until a sudden gust pushes again the panniers and knocks me off balance. My hands (a map in one, my phone in the other) fly to the handlebars and I instinctively put my left foot out to steady myself.

Except my left foot is the one that is still attached to the bike.

My hapless jerking motion while trying to free my foot pushes the center of gravity further to the left and I tip over, ingloriously landing on the rough asphalt and sand.

My first thought is my pride, and I quickly scan the surrounding area for observers, but its a weekday and windy and I don’t think anyone saw. I unclip my foot from the pedal stand up and check the bike – other than the seat getting knocked around it seems fine. My wrist is a little sore and blood pools on my knee and runs down my leg. Nothings broken, so I throw the map and phone into the handlebar bag, right the seat, hop back on and ride away feeling like a cat that just walked into a sliding glass door.

-

-

May 21: Santa Barbara Bike Path

The problem with traveling to Santa Barbara is that once you are there its hard to find a good reason to ever leave again.

Left Malibu on my touring bike at 8:00 this morning. In Oxnard now headed to Santa Barbara.

The trip is getting close isn’t it. I’ve got about one more week at the beach, then I’ll be back in the rock for a big stretch of photography work before takeoff. I’m really stoked about today as its my first “real” test ride. I’m heading up to Santa Barbara – will be crashing on a couch up there overnight, then back down here tomorrow. The trip is between 65-85 miles depending on if i follow googles suggested route or the path on the ACA maps. I’m thinking I’ll probably follow google even though its longer just to stay off of the freeway.

Here’s a peak a Googles proposed route – I’ll let you know how it goes.

-

-

May 20: Board Rooms

…No worries, man, don’t pay attention to the vaguely recognizable faces you see at the liquor store; just grab your stuff and come on up to the house. When you get here, stroll past the Italian coupe haphazardly parked out front, past the heavy wooden doors, across the imported marble tiles, through the gourmet dine-in kitchen, past the telescope used for watching the cargo ships pass.

Out onto the back deck, down the stairs – the smells of the ocean rising to meet you – feel the cool sand sticking to your feet, walk around the corner and look back into the shadows. There it is, under the house, up above the high-tide line, tucked in among the pilings. The board room. All that other stuff is just bullshit for the neighbors. This is what really matters.

Life is in the living.

May 19: Santa Monica Volleyball Courts

The marine layer had already turned into a light drizzle by the time I left the Shaker’s house on Sunday evening. The area around the pier – so crowded on my way out in the morning – was nearly deserted as I rode back to the beach lair in the gloom.

I like the beach when it’s cold and empty and quiet – just sitting there waiting for the tide to come in.