Back on the road after a decadent 2 day rest stop in Lafayette. So much fun eating great food, motorcycling and enjoying good friends. After more than a month on the road, much of it by myself, I really appreciate being with friends! What is really interesting is describing the ride and what I am thinking about during hours and hours of time in the saddle. Great to retell it as it brings things into sharper focus. There is a lot of time in what I would call a meditative state (or zoned out lol). Just letting the brain run. We have so little time to do that in today’s world, so to do it is really a luxury. What is allows for is coming to thoughts and ideas naturally, not forcing it, and that seems to allow them to develop more fully and with more potential paths to progress through. I keep coming back to the challenges faced when embarking on any longer termed endeavor or or difficult goal, and what is required to prepare and overcome the mental obstacles, not just in the moment but in such a way that creates a robust process and reduces the risk of abandoning the objective. So often we are inspired to do something big or reach for something we didn’t think we could achieve only to have that motivation fade or the magnitude of the effort overwhelm us and we abandon the effort. One of the advantages of the bike trip I’m on is that “abandoning” is logistically difficult! But that still doesn’t stop the brain from coming us with all kinds of reasons to when the day gets tough, which it does almost every day. For me it comes back to building a strong base of achievement and self confidence, one built not of a few massive “wins” but of a lot of easier achieved goals that reinforce my capabilities, move me toward the larger objective, and are are more sustainable because they are smaller and easier to complete. The base and the milestones that you establish not only should be realistically achievable and sustainable but also provide/create as many future paths to the goal as possible. That way the risk of being derailed is reduced. More on that as I complete the ride...
Today was an easier day, only 60 miles (“only”, LOL how my perspective has changed!). I rode country roads for most of the ride, stopping in cool little Louisiana towns and enjoying the scenery. That is until a massive German Shepard came bolting out of a yard to get me! For some reason, dogs universally hate bicyclists and being chased is a regular occurrence. Most times you can out run them or there is a fence or they lose interest when you are past their house. I love dogs but HATE getting chased. All the blogs advise bringing pepper spray (which I have) but I just couldn’t use it. Mostly I yell and peddle hard. But today this Shepard was too smart, he picked a line to get right in front of me and was moving at speed! Bad for two reasons, 1) because I could hit him, surely injuring me and him, and 2) because if I dont collide with him, he has an easy shot at biting my legs! So I decided my only option was to be the bigger dog today: before he was close enough to run into, I suddenly veered my bike right at him and yelled. It worked! It freaked him out enough that he veered away to a parallel path which he kept for two house snarling away but getting no closer. Crisis averted. I took the next road I could find to the major highway (90) that was running parallel to the country road and took it the remainder of the way... Jeez.
Morgan City is not that big but I found a nice place for dinner (the dinner special had an amazing amount for food for $15!) and a bar next to the hotel for a complete beers and good conversation with some locals (all working the offshore oil business). New Orleans tomorrow!!
