Why I Ride?


Its been a long several weeks at work. We have had construction going on in our offices and my team has been busy relocating folks to temporary office space on Thursdays and Fridays and then moving them back to their reconstructed office space on Mondays. This has involved a lot of crawling under desks, moving computers, relocating phone circuits, moving heavy printers, and the like. It has been four weeks of this process, and we have quickly arrived at a point where we do not want to hear the words office and move in the same paragraph let alone the same sentence.

This past weekend was the final phase of the four phase project. But to make the weekend a little more exciting, headquarters also scheduled a phone system replacement/upgrade on Friday as well. So after two days of relocating staff, we then spent Friday night at the office performing a cut over of the office phone circuit and from the old phone switch to the new one as well as swapping out all of the phone sets with new models, testing and verifying functionality.

Fortunately, the phone system work went off without a hitch even though we could not place phones in 14 offices because they were getting painted and re-carpeted and another 10 offices because access was blocked by cubicle furniture parts stacked out of the way for the office construction. We had estimated wrapping up the work at 10pm Friday night, but we were completed by 8pm. So, I was soon headed to the motorcycle parking in the bowels of the building ready for a couple days away from the job.

When I rolled out of the tunnel onto the city street, I quickly realized it had rained maybe an hour earlier and the unbearable heat had been broken by the rain and the temperature was around 74F as opposed to the 94F I had ridden home in all week.

As I began my 42 miles commute home, I could feel myself relax and my shoulders and neck began to lose the stiffness I had felt when I walked out. The cool wind in my face felt invigorating. The longer I rode the better I felt. As I gently weaved my way thru the Friday night traffic I remembered why I enjoy riding motorcycles and why I chose to ride to work. Its not because the bike gets more than twice the fuel mileage that my pickup gets. Its because of how much I enjoy riding a motorcycle. How free and alive I feel as I am rolling through the gears and watching things fly by in my peripheral vision. The smell of the fresh rain evaporating off the roadway, the sounds of everything you pass, the gazes of the people in the cages you pass that seem to be wishing they were on a motorcycle all add to it.

When I walked out of the office door and punched the elevator, I felt worn out like an old leather baseball glove, like I had been rode hard and put up wet. But after an hours ride on Rosie, I rolled into the garage at home feeling refreshed, relaxed, and alive.

I am truly blessed to be able to ride as much as I do and I am grateful.

-Peace

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