Ivan. I promise--because his last post seems to indicate that he might not live very long after deleting my first, and thus far, only post. To tell the truth I am too endorphined-up to care.
That's the best thing about this trip--the endorphins. I may be exhausted, my butt hurts, my hands hurt, my shoulders hurt, my knees hurt, and I have one hell of a sunburn, but truth be told I am happy about it. But then again this is only the end of day two, and the soreness is only going to get worse before it gets better.
Day two and about 56 miles into it. Virginia is beautiful; everything is so green. All the corn fields are about as tall as I am, and the wheat has turned its lovely golden color. With all this green there are bugs abound. The ground crawls, but I think because I am outside, I know I will be outside for the next couple months, and I know I will have to deal with them I can handle it. It's the intruders in the home, the many legged trespassers that bother me. But out here they don't bother me that much--I even picked up a spider, who was in my tent, and put him outside...without screaming.
The weather--is insane. Don't get me wrong it is beautiful here, but it is so hot and so humid. I am sweating more than I ever have. I can't keep sunscreen on. As soon as I lather myself up, I sweat it off. If I stopped biking to put on sunscreen every time I actually needed to, I would still be sitting outside the train station in Richmond. And it brings up this question: what is worse, getting skin cancer from the sun or putting on heavy metal enriched cream all over your body, which by the way is also carcinogenous?
It is hard to think about this trip in its entirety: three months, 4200 miles, biking practically everyday. It is daunting; it makes each pedal stroke and each breath of air feel like a trap that I am drowning in. It is too much. So I have to think about all of this one day at a time--one mile at a time. I may not have the mental strength for this, to push myself mile after mile, but I am stubborn enough. I said I would do this, so I will. But I am learning that strength and stubbornness are not the same thing.
