Inspiration

I recently submitted a draft article to a national cycling magazine hoping for publication, but not to my surprise, the editor didn't want it. But his feedback included lots of good advice which I shall obviously take on board – there's no way I'm going to ignore professional advice from a professional editor!

But the latest version of this particular cycling magazine, along with the editor's advice, has set me thinking. The articles within the magazine are about massive, extraordinary feats of endurance; long-distance riding above 4,000 meters altitude, riding 9,000 km along the Iron Curtain; these tours are I assume intended to inspire people to adventure. But they don't inspire me at all. I didn't even feel I wanted to read them. Why? Because you need to be super-able and super-confident to do these things, or you need to be able to survive without income and be away from work for an extended period. Most working people have neither the time nor the opportunity for such mammoth excursions, even if they have the physical ability to undertake them. I know these trips are for others and not for me and when I see them dominating the magazine, I just groan.

I need inspiration, but I need realistic inspiration. I want to read about things I might actually be inspired to do. Places I might be inspired to visit, and places I might be capable of visiting. Rides I might be able to do, if I am prepared to stretch myself.

Am I alone? Do desk-bound and normal working people really want to read about adventures they will probably never have? Do they really like reading about super-achievers they can never be? Surely we can't all be world-adventurers, even if we can all be weekend adventurers.

But then again (as it was recently pointed out to me) millions of people watch professional football on the television, though an impossibly minute few actually get to play it. So there's clearly something I'm missing here, and it's me that doesn't get it!

I have just two ambitions. I want someday to inspire one person, and I also want to be paid something, however little, for something I have written. I am sure I will achieve these two ambitions one day. Hopefully, I'll achieve them on the same day.

What a Year!

This year is far from over, but it's feeling a bit backendish and so I am going to indulge myself with a bit of a review of the year.

It's been a fabulous year. I started off recovered from last year's surgery, but not fit. I went to Spain for six weeks aiming to improve my fitness and rode over a thousand miles, transforming myself to the point where the first solo ride I did when I returned was my longest for over four years at 67 miles.

Rannoch Moor

Spring came, and Paul and I had a fabulous holiday in Scotland on our tandem with a CUK group led by our friend Gary. We had good company, superb riding and I heard (but didn't see) a corncrake!

Framlingham Castle

I spent a week in the beautiful Suffolk countryside when I went to the CUK Birthday Rides in Framlingham. There I rode with friends most days and I also did a couple of solitary rides, all with only a spot or two of rain and in rolling countryside which won my heart.

Kirkby Lonsdale

Not long after I returned, I found myself needing to be in Scotland again, this time to drive the van in support of my husband's CUK mountain bike tour of the West Highland Way and the Scottish Off-road Coast to Coast. But I didn't drive to Scotland. I rode there, alone and unsupported, with two small panniers and a tiny bar bag. 

Twelve months ago I would never have believed a year could be so good. Being so consistently free from illness was a dream I dare not have. Riding my bike whenever I wanted to, booking onto trips without fear of cancelling, and arranging to meet up with friends were all things I couldn't do.

The year has been great, almost scarily so, and I hardly dare hope that 2017 will be half as good!

Back to my First Love

If there's anyone out there reading this, it'll be pretty apparent that I haven't written anything for a while. And it'll also be pretty apparent why I haven't.

But life is good again. In fact, it's simply amazing - I just can't remember when I last felt this good and when I felt so positive about the future.

When I say I feel good of course I mean that the aches and pains I have are good aches and pains. You see I rode my bike yesterday, maybe a little too far in view of my still some-way-to-go fitness. My right knee hurts, and all of my left leg hurts. And my neck, my buttocks, and my right hand - but these are the types of pain I like to feel!

Yesterday was my first ride after returning from six weeks in Spain. I'll write about that another time because just now I want to focus on yesterday.

I set out into wind-less Spring freshness, and before I'd ridden ten metres I was overwhelmed by birdsong. I rode to Newtown where I met up with a Sky Breeze ride led ably by a lovely woman called Jackie. With two other girls (both a good deal younger than Jackie and I) we set off uphill, on a main road which on Sunday at least, is relatively free of traffic. I fought to stay on, but Jackie looked after me, riding beside me at all times. We had tea in a charming community cafe and then we set off up onto open moors toward a moorland watershed, and I place I just love. It was a simply lovely road, which I wouldn't have known about but for Jackie's willingness to take on the responsibility of leading others.

There I said goodbye to the girls, to ride home my own way. It was so beautiful in the crisp sunshine, with the cacophony of birdsong and swooping, courting skylarks, that I had to stop after a short while. I dug out my slightly crushed sandwich and ate it by the roadside.

This, as if I didn't know, is why I love cycling - my bike takes me to places that a car can only separate you from. My bike puts me in the land, without that sterilising layer of glass and metal.

I feel like the old me now, and I am back on track. Summer is just around the corner and I can't wait.