Before heading for bed the night before,in the darkness of the park, I pulled out my map into the streetlight because, inspired by my success on the River Road, I had an idea that I could try to do the Bearinger Road loop. Older or perhaps birthed in the same dawn as the River Road loop (that one August day two years ago where I left work at the end of the day, during a light rain, heartbroken and empty, and biked north, stopping at Columbia Lake on the dock to shout into the water and sky "This is the beginning!", that day when I began to re-learn my geography and re-write my history), the Bearinger loop has daunted me time and again. A brilliant success it was that first day in August to make it round the corner from Westmount to University - burst of sun through clouds, golden rods exploding in sunshine by the road side, big blue cloudy sky - freedom! - a thrill it was to arrive at Fischer Hallman and University, feeling myself on the cold hard edge of the world - a delicious thrill to pedal a short ways down Bearinger, savouring every revolution, loving the open fields, feeling wild under the big sky, - knowing I'd have to turn around shortly. I could not go any further. Bearinger stretched away vastly in an eastern curve of green and fields, looking endless and inviting and terrifying. I longed to return to that once familiar path along the lake, that country road in the middle of the city, where I had spent many a golden evening in the my first year of university. But, not on this or many other days.
This morning I came from the East, up the Iron Horse Trail through the University and into North Campus. Summer morning, quiet. I am comfortable in the North Campus: it's empty post-apocalyptic fields still feel as wild and thrilling as they did 2 years go when they were my first discovery after re-discovering Columbia Lake. Pushing through, steadily, with confidence, ready to meet my goal, I felt myself steady, calm, focused, like an athlete before a race. Up the hill to Bearinger, then down Bearinger, watching the north west end of Waterloo open before me, fields, trees, powerlines, distant developments, fresh winds from the North, imaginings of the country beyond. Picking up speed, I began to repeat to myself, without words, with ideas, that I could do this. I come to the lights at the intersection of Bearinger and Hagey Blvd: the farthest reaches of my present universe. I was not turning down Hagey on this day, although even that takes courage. I sped through the lights and found myself heading without hesitation down the country road.
There was a man walking down the road, on the left side, heading in the same direction as myself. I told myself two times that if a man was walking all the way down the road (because where would he go if not to the end of it?) than surely this is a safe and ordinary place, a place where people take walks and the walking is the most ordinary thing in the world. The road was very busy, frighteningly busy, with narrow shoulders and overhanging trees. I was mildly anxious for the man's safety, and my own. I stopped at the shoulder to remove my hat and gloves, and my sweaters fell off the back of my bike and I had to reorganize myself and still I was not afraid. Because, moments before, this had happened:
I realized very suddenly, only a hundred yards past the interaction, that I could SEE the end of the road. I look carefully, many times, as I traveled along, to see if it was a trick of the angle, but no, the road was amazingly short and I was traveling through it in what I can only describe as an strangely disappointingly short amount of time. The trees alongside the road lost their luster and the day became a little dull and flat, although still so objectively beautiful. I smiled with the joy of success, and the success felt a little hollow. I simply felt that I had missed some part of the challenge, that a piece was missing, some vital energy, of anxiety, of fear, or even just of effort. It felt so effortless. I tried to appreciate the beauty of the day and felt very little but ordinary, which was not an unpleasant feeling, just unexpected. This feeling continued up around the corner, and then I got distracted looking at the new Library and YMCA building. By the time I came out in the hard and shining end of the universe of Fischer Hallman and University, I felt mildly glorious again, with the feeling of accomplishment and freedom and the enjoyment of the sun on this cool morning - and yet tinged with a certain dullness and disappointment or maybe just surprise, of the kind you get when you slay a dragon and then wonder if you'll ever again feel the sublime thrill of it's mystery and terror. It makes you wonder if the beauty was in the fear, or rather, the fear came from the beauty. When the world feels so beautiful that all you can do is shake and shiver, and you can only look on it for a few moments. And this felt like the opposite of that, where the world is so ordinary that you wonder what all the fuss of getting there was about. I remembered suddenly that near by to here was the trail I'd written one of my first blog posts about.
Although the dullness was there, I was still pretty pleased to have made it this far and to feel the confidence to go further. I was not unaware that although at this moment I felt a little let down, the success of this ride was opening doors in my mind to further adventures and many possible freedoms. I went further down University, but found the loud and fast-moving traffic to make it an unenjoyable ride, not worth the physical and emotional effort. So I stopped in a wild suburban park and admired the colours of goldenrod, purple aster and a small white flower against the tangled and abundant dark green of later summer foliage.
My phone rang and I didn't answer it, not recognizing the number, and then I became anxious, feeling at the end of the invisible energy thread I'd spun out this far. I felt this was completely reasonable given the success of the day, so I returned to University and took Fischer Hallman down to Clair Lake Park. There, I sat and enjoyed the conversation of ducks, the weight and lightness of willows, and the memory of reading Dharma Bums in this very spot one year ago. Later on I went to the Medieval Faire, where a palm reader told me I had a strong heart line, and thus a strong feeling, but that my emotions were in balance, and that I knew my own mind.
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