Cyclist: A Survivor In Mariupol

Yesterday I wrote about the world's first acid trip, which Dr. Albert Hofmann took, if unwittingly, on his bike ride home.

If you've ever been on an "acid trip," you know that it can include visions heavenly or hellish.  The latter could describe what this cyclist--who, I assume, was not under the influence of LSD or any other substance--exprienced:

Photo by Alexander Ermochencko, for Reuters

Reports I've read and heard say that Mariupol, a port city in Ukraine, has been "wiped off the face of the earth," or words to that effect.  I have no reason to doubt such reports:  The reports and accompanying images show steel stick-figures, the skeletons of destroyed buildings and rubble everywhere.  And though there is death and destruction everywhere, thankfully, many have survived.  Their lives, like the ride of that cyclist, will go on.

A Trip On Bicycle Day

Today is Bicycle Day.  Tomorrow is Weed Day.

About the latter, there are many stories about its origin--why, specifically, the 20th of April is associated with marijuana.  The most plausible-sounding one involves a group of teenagers in Marin County, California (the birthplace of mountain biking) who met at 4:20 in the afternoon to partake.  They chose that time, according to lore, because their schools' extracurricular activities ended by that time and as Dave Reddix, one of the group, recalled, "We got tired of the Friday night football scene with all of the jocks."  Because they met at that time, "420" became their code for weed.  Later, Reddix worked as a Grateful Dead roadie and the term went viral, so to speak.

On the other hand, the story of how today became Bicycle Day is more closely documented.  On this date in 1943, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann ingested a small amount of a compound derived from ergot fungus.  Feeling disoriented, he rode his bicycle home.  Along the way, he experienced the beautiful and terrible effects of that compound, lysergic acid diethymalide.  So,. in more ways than one, Dr. Hoffmann took the world's first acid trip.

So, in honor of Dr. Hofmann on Bicycle Day, I am posting a video of the song that, in its own way, is "a real trip":

Hofmann lived another 65 years after his "trip," to the age of 102.  It must have been the bicycling!

(Tell me what a latter-day hippie living in California had in mind when he called his book about bicycle touring "Bike Tripping.")

The Calico Chronicles

If you've been reading this blog for the past few years, you know I love Marlee.  Sometimes, though, she exasperates me:  There are some things I simply can't get her to do.  I mean, I know she doesn't have opposable thumbs and, well, she's a cat. But still...

I just hope that if she reads this, she doesn't think that I wish she were Marilyn.  She's writing a memoir, "Calico Cycles," about her trip around the US.  So far she's traveled over 10,000 miles in 32 states since last May and has seen a lot--from the basket of a bicycle.

Now, in case Marlee thinks I'm judging her for not writing, I'll remind her of what I've said before:  Writing skills are not a sign of intelligence or any kind of worth.  (Why do you think Socrates never wrote?) But, you know, Marlee babe, I tried taking you on rides and almost lost you.  

You do have an excuse:  I didn't start training you early enough.  Marilyn's human, Caleb Werntz, started when she was two months old.  You, Marlee, were six months old when you came into my life, and you were born on the street, so perhaps it was too late, or you had (and possibly still have) PTSD from your previous life.

Anyway, Werntz, who hails from Portland (where else?) "got her a harness and leash and put her in the front basket" and took her for her first "training ride" nine years ago.  He says that she's slept through most of the journey (Is something a journey if you sleep through it?) but she was nonetheless able to "write" her diary, which he's "translating."  

(That might be the hardest part of all:  Translating is never easy.  I know: I've done it, mostly badly.)

It sounds a bit like a role-reversed "Travels With Charley," although I don't know whether Marilyn is "in search of America, as Steinbeck was--or, for that matter, whether she's read Steinbeck.

Caleb has begun a Kickstarter campaign to raise funds so he can raise money to "promote and distribute" copies of the travel diary.  I can forgive Marlee for not knowing how to do that:  I've never taught her to use the Internet!