Day 53 — I Made It to North Sydney!
It was a cold 7°C this morning, and the sun hadn’t yet reached the lowland where our campground was tucked away.
My teeth were chattering as I coasted downhill out of camp toward the road to North Sydney.
And then the road turned sharply upward to a steep and long climb.
I was excited about it.
I needed some blood flowing back into my cold-numbed fingers and toes.
As I reached the top of the climb, the first warm glow of sunlight hit me.
Life IS good.
Fifty-three days ago, before this journey began, I would never have willingly gone for a bike ride when the temperature dipped below 10°C.
And I certainly never looked forward to a big climb.
During this trip, people told me I’d get so sick of riding a bike that I might never want to do it again.
Yet when I woke this morning, I couldn’t wait to get riding.
Something changed in me somewhere along the road, weeks ago, somewhere before Winnipeg.
Until then, despite all my determination, there had been this nagging little question buried somewhere inside me:
Can I really do this?
At some point, that question was replaced by something very different:
“You can’t stop me from doing this!”
There were several other, bigger climbs today.
My legs feel strong. I can feel the power moving through the drivetrain. For moments, it feels as though I could keep doing this forever.
After 53 days and thousands of kilometres, I’m enjoying cycling more than ever.
This was the shortest ride of the journey this far…but, with the great weather, one of the very best, surrounded by cloudless skies, calm ocean and endless forest.
The “Returning” Years
As I wrote in an earlier post, I neglected too many old friendships during my “Earning” years—the years of paying the mortgage, raising kids, building a career and simply trying to keep everything moving forward.
I love the notion that now, in my “Returning” years, I should also be returning to some of those old relationships—with good people who once meant a great deal to me.
It was in that spirit that I was delighted to receive an email today from an old friend I had allowed to slip out of my life.
His name is Don.
Don had seen the CTV interview about the Ride for Di and wrote to ask how he could make a donation.
What a wonderful gesture.
And what a reminder of how guilty I feel for not keeping in touch.
Because Don played a much bigger role in my life than he probably realizes.
It was sometime around 2006 when Don and his wife, Pauline, invited us and some other friends over for Saturday-night dinner.
At some point that evening, I told Don how discouraged I was that I could no longer run because of my bad knee. I was overweight, out of shape and missing something that had once been an important part of my life.
Don is an exceptionally good listener.
More importantly, he is empathetic.
He took me into his garage and showed me his road bike.
I can’t remember exactly what he said. I don’t think it was anything profound. He simply suggested that maybe I should try cycling.
If sporting-goods stores opened at noon on Sundays back then, by about 1:00 the next afternoon I had bought a thousand-dollar bike—and, to my considerable astonishment, another thousand dollars’ worth of things I had never previously known existed but apparently were absolutely essential to riding one: pedals, cycling shoes, Lycra shorts, jersey, helmet…
Who knew a bicycle was the inexpensive part?
But something else happened.
Cycling became a love.
Years later, when my son Mike was struggling with running injuries and was told he might never race competitively again, I found myself having my own version of the “Don talk” with him.
Eventually, I bought Mike a bike for his birthday.
And wow, did he ever connect with it.
Which brings me back to this morning.
Here I am, nearly 20 years after that Saturday-night conversation, cycling through Cape Breton on a beautiful fall day.
I’m on Day 53 of a ride across Canada in memory of my sister Dianne.
And I’m pushing toward the finish because I want to get to Montreal in time to watch Mike compete at the World Championships—at the highest level of cycling in the world.
Think about that.
A friend listened to another friend who was feeling discouraged.
Without Don, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be on this bike today.
There might never have been a Ride for Di.
And who knows what path Mike’s athletic life might have taken?
We rarely know the impact we have on another person’s life.
Sometimes it isn’t a grand gesture.
Sometimes we don’t need the perfect words.
Sometimes we just need to listen.
To understand what someone is struggling with.
And perhaps gently point toward another possibility.
Don probably had no idea what he started that Saturday night.
But I do now.
A simple moment of empathy can change everything.
Thanks, Don.
Who thought that little conversation in your garage could turn out to be one of the amazing moments in the Journey of My Life.
I’m riding across Canada in memory of my sister Dianne and to help fight ovarian cancer. If you’d like to support the Ride for Di, please consider making a donation to Ovarian Cancer Canada. Every donation, large or small, helps make this journey more meaningful.
Barry, when we lived in Tokyo we learned about “goen.” It’s a term rooted in Buddhism and means relationship or tie. Think of it as karmic connection, a special bond between people, places, or things that happen. Meeting a friend, is destiny not chance or coincidence. You’ve experienced a lot of goen in the past 53 days and will continue to enjoy it in the future. Ride on. Ride for Di.