Thirty years aren’t enough to keep me off the open road

Last time I tried it, I was 30 years younger and 30 pounds lighter. I rode my bike (the kind with pedals) from Grand Rapids to Quebec, a distance of 500 miles plus change. The trip I’m planning next month is more modest, but not by much. I plan to ride from Lake Huron to Lake Michigan and—if I’m still drawing breath by then—back again.

According to the folks at Google Maps, it’s just under 500 miles, round trip.

That doesn’t seem like much if you’re floating along in an Escalade, 403 horses pushing you smoothly along the asphalt at 70 mph while the air conditioner pumps out arctic blasts and Alanis Morissette resonates smoothly from your surround sound speaker system. But trust me; if you’re grunting your way one geezer-powered mile at a time over dusty back roads, the distance seems considerably more daunting.

I’m not sure what put the idea for the trip into my head. I’ve been riding a lot lately, for the exercise, I suppose, but mostly just for the fun of it. I average between 25 and 35 miles a day. Sometimes I overdo it and my knees wind up hurting; when that happens I take a day off.

The weather’s been for the most part cooperative and it’s cheaper than joining a gym.

A couple days ago I began mapping out my trip in broad strokes. Since I’m not Lance Armstrong (the only similarity being that at one time we were both hot for Cheryl Crow) I plan to take things slow. I’m hoping to average about 50 miles per day, or five days each direction. If I fall behind my schedule, then I fall behind. The people from Sports Illustrated will not be waiting for me at the finish line.

My good friend Anne (not the Anne I was dating who these days would prefer to see me staked naked to an anthill and smothered in honey, but a different Anne) lives near Lake Michigan. She has promised to have cold beer and grilled steak waiting for me when I arrive. Considering how I’m likely to smell by the time I get there, I consider this the ultimate act of friendship.

Along the way I plan to camp out along the road or in campgrounds if any happen to be nearby at the end of the day. I may stay in a hotel once or twice, again if I’m near one at day’s end. Mostly, with regard to accommodations, I’m playing it by ear.

There’s far too much organization, planning and foresight in adult life. When I was 19, I planned diddley. All the planning for my long-ago trip to Quebec involved strapping a tarp and sleeping bag to the back of my bike and peddling north. I had no change of clothes, very little money, and no map. I just went.

Being older and allegedly wiser these days, I’m putting a little more thought into this trip, but again, not too much thought. I’m taking more money, a better sleeping bag and a one-man tent instead of a sheet of moldy plastic. I’m also taking my GPS, a map, my cell phone, my mini-laptop computer, my…OK, I’ll admit it; I’m taking everything I can carry.

Just in case.

Last time I tried something like this, a Georgia peanut farmer was President of the United States. I was 19, immortal, and invulnerable. My life stretched out in front of me like a field before the plow; the future glimmered with hope and promise.

Those days are gone; the years behind me are almost certainly more numerous than those yet to come.

But there are still places I haven’t seen, ideas I haven’t considered, folks with whom I’ve never spoken. Life is every bit as fresh and filled with wonder as it was all those long years ago.

If it takes a sore backside and tired knees to remember that, well, that’s a small price to pay.

More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.