What would my younger self have thought?
My younger self was not only, well, younger, but also stronger, skinnier and perhaps sillier: Even after I’d given up on racing, I prided myself on riding like a racer. Some of that may have had to do with living as male and riding, if not solo, then mostly in the company of male riders who were racers, ex-racers or wannabes.
Now I’m going to make a confession: While I sometimes rode just as hard and fast during my solo rides, on other solo rides—and only on solo rides, I’d stop to look at buildings, trees or flowers.
Which is what I’ve been doing lately. In this part of the world, we are entering the peak of cherry blossom season and I’m becoming a blossom rider—or a cherry chaser?
If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know that few things make me happier, if for a moment, than those pink blooms. (Lilacs, which should be showing up soon, are another.)
It’s not just their prettiness that moves me. I must say that I never understood haiku or Japanese art (or why it so inspired Monet and other Impressionist artists) until I paid attention to cherry blossoms.
You see, haiku isn’t just about the syllable count and Japanese painting isn’t only a style. Both are about experiencing the beauty and intensity of something in a moment but appreciating that moment’s ephemerality. And that, I believe, is the reason why there’s so much respect for elders and ancestors in Japanese culture.
So…while my recent rides have been sensual and aesthetic experiences—which my younger self would have secretly embraced—they have also been lessons which, possibly, my younger self could not’ve understood.
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