O for 2 and Feeling Salty

I thought about not blogging tonight, first because I have been annoyingly prolific with the blogs lately, and second because I am in a pretty brutal mood about this whole cycling thing at the moment. 

But....I can't just journal about this project when I am feeling elated, buoyant or accomplished.  After all, it's supposed to be real. 

So, here it is.  I have now attempted this 30 mile ride twice, and I have failed twice.  In a row.  One day after the other.  Yesterday, of course, it was due to the crash.  Tonight, I headed out to Lake Viva Naughton AGAIN and Adam and Aislynn drove out to meet me at the turn around AGAIN, but still no dice.  When I got 13 miles out, I found out my phone wasn't working.  It was turning on, but not recognizing the sim card.  I took the battery out and still no go.  I repeated that process (I know.. definition of insanity) and still no go. 

Adam had long since passed me in the SUV and was no doubt already enjoying the beauty of Viva Naughton in the early evening.  I was way late due to the fact that I had finally succumbed to the agony of the steepest climb on the route and had to get off my bike and walk up it.  I had gotten up it before, but this time as I was slowly, slowly, s-l-o-w-l-y climbing it in my granny gear, I was attacked by mosquitos.  I started swatting them off me (there were about 12 of them on my thigh at once - ugh) and slowed to a stop. And it was a really, really loooooong hill.  And then there was the whole stop-to-restart-my-phone-several-times thing (have I mentioned Einstein's definition of insanity?). 

So it was no wonder that as I continued riding, Adam came back in the SUV to see what was taking me so long.  I showed him my phone, set my bike down on the side of the road and hopped in the car.  My technology genius husband couldn't get it going, either.  For some strange reason, that really validated me. 

Adam asked what I wanted to do, and I told him to put the bike in the back.  "Really? You don't want to ride back??"  He was surprised.  I mumbled some excuses about the sun going down and not having my phone just in case, and Adam went to get the bike from where we left it.

But the real truth is, I was afraid.  Really afraid.  After yesterday's fall, harmless though it turned out to be, I am scared to death to be stranded, hurt, hit by a truck, chased by a moose (or cow, or llama), you name it.  It turns out for all my sounding my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world, I am not, in fact fearless.  Just the opposite.

How can I ever do this if I can't overcome my own fear, my own thoughts, my own doubts?

So today I end this blog, scratching mosquito bites and feeling frustrated, mad at myself, ashamed, discouraged.

Night, blog.