The end of pictures a day, but onward with 100 miles a week

Well, taking a picture from a bike ride every day was a fun experiment for February, and did you notice how once February ended I dropped it immediately? Ha. I did enjoy the aspect of looking at the world through a “what would make art” lens, although most of what I saw that I loved I didn’t end up even actually taking pictures of. Like there was a picture-perfect cormorant sitting wings spread on a rock with a totally glassy reflection in the Columbia River Slough one morning, but I didn’t want to disturb it by stopping and fumbling to pull out a camera. So that one, plus many others, just live on in my head. But it was fun to note them, even if I didn’t record them.

Did it help me bike more? I’m not sure. There were probably a few days (like when I was in Vegas with my family) that I might not have ridden otherwise, but mostly I was already riding.

But it was fun. And also now I’m glad to not be doing it anymore;) In part because I just didn’t love being on my computer in that way every day to post things. And also because March starts my more field-work-heavy time of work, where there are sometimes days where I am just flat-out gone, in some random far-flung part of Washington without my bike.

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(like this very early-morning (and unexpectedly snowy!) run up Mount Si — apparently one of the most popular hikes ever, but on account of the extreme headlamp-in-the-dark-almost-all-the-way-up earliness I had the summit to myself and only saw one other person on my way down;) I had to make it back for work breakfast at 8am, ha)

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I will say, though, that this week I am proud of myself for a thing that I wrote about much earlier for those of you paying attention, about this being the year where I try again to actually bike 100 miles per week. This week would have been very easy to just not even bother, since I was gone Monday-Wednesday for work without my bike, and then had a ten-hour field day on Thursday, and then will be gone again tomorrow through Monday for a sweet ladies’ retreat with some friends. So I kind of figured this would just be a throwaway week and I would make up for it later with a few weeks where I rode more.

BUT! Just sneaking in some rides here and there adds up to a lot over time. Monday morning, for example, before I left, I snuck in a 20-mile joyride down to Milwaukie and all around looking at urban waterways. After I got home on Wednesday, James and I took a little toodle down the Willamette to listen for frogs; Thursday after a very long day I rode with James to drop him off at the airport and then to run some late-night errands; today a little joyride turned into a nearly-40-mile day. And thus it is that I have ridden 97 miles already this week and will ride the last three plus some more I’m sure tomorrow morning before we leave.

So I’m feeling good about upholding a commitment to myself this week. AND I’m grateful for that goal of mine, since without it I probably wouldn’t have biked as much, but both my body and soul are glad that I’ve done so.