Cyclist hurled into past by apparition of self on downtown street

From a sidewalk table at a downtown coffee shop the other day, I watched a former version of myself ride by – a bike messenger. She was about 24, like I was when I had that job in the seventies, and she even sort of looked like me then. I had moved to Seattle on a whim, a whim that said, “Ug! I need to get out of Dodge.” Dodge being Eugene, where I was aimlessly wandering in and out of interesting courses at the university. Nothing like a few months of physical labor to drive you right back to studying with a whole new sense of purpose, but that’s another story.

I got a job at Bucky’s Messenger Service, thrilled to find you could be paid to ride your bike all day. I would have been completely happy except for the small detail that I had no idea how to eat. Add that to the fact that most of downtown Seattle sits at a 45 degree incline, and you have a simple math problem that doesn’t add up. Nothing plus nothing does not equal something.

I was so tired and thirsty by the end of a day that I’d buy a watermelon at the market on the way home and eat about half of it, thinking it would serve the dual purpose of filling me up and quenching my thirst without having to prepare anything. Then I’d crash into my bed and wake up the next morning and not eat enough breakfast. For lunch I’d buy something cheap but filling at the market. By the end of the day I’d be way too comatose to throw anything together for dinner, and I’d seek instant relief with the watermelon trick again. And around and around I went.

Ridiculous. I don’t know why I was being so dumb. My mother always fed me well – you’d think I’d have picked up a few tips. I guess I got onto a jag and couldn’t get off it. But this brings me to a topic I’ve been wanting to touch on in my blog, namely Fueling Your Biking Habit – because if you don’t eat right, you’re not goina like it.

I’ve been doing some experimenting with this in recent months, and I’ll be sharing some exciting findings with you in upcoming posts. You may think exciting is a strong word to use about food consumption, but really – I’ve made some discoveries that really work, thereby solving some problems that have plagued me and threatened my biking. Don’t worry. I’m not going to bore you with little pyramids covered with food words.

Good News Hint: It turns out that advancing age is not the problem. (Yay.)