Reclaiming Me

In my mind, I'm lean and mean flying like the wind on my light weight 10 speed Raleigh Grand Prix.  Long legs pumping.

In reality?  

Ummmmm ... the reality is far different from the dream.

I'm not over six feet tall.   I'm not lean and mean.  I'm not n my 20's anymore.

My legs are short.   So is the rest of me. I'm a bit overweight. And I'm over 60. Well past my prime.

However, adapting to everything that life and workplace bullying has thrown at me and getting out and riding again is still satisfying.  Oh so satisfying.

Even if I am an overwide load.

*****

In my 20's I started riding a bike.  The idea was to get healthier and to provide transportion while a university student.  My bike at the time was a green five speed Schwinn.  It was sturdy.  Built like a Sherman tank - and weighed about as much.

After university, I still rode that bike for exercise.  I got so I could go 5-10 niles a day.  I was still short, but leaner and meaner then.

When I moved to Texas, the bike went with me.  Again, we rode 5-10 miles a day in heat, in wind (which always blew), in sun.

I eventually got my leanest and meanest bike ever - a 10 speed, brown Raleigh Grand Prix - which I still have.  The problem was I was living in a border area where it was not safe for a woman to ride alone.  So eventually I stopped riding.  When I moved to Canada, my bike moved with me.

After all was said and done in the workplace, I wanted to ride again.  I wanted to feel free.  But I never got into the groove again.

The problem was, I was no longer lean and mean.  The aging process and the chronic affects of PTSD post workplace bullying/abuse and a few extra pounds gathered along the way, changed things for me.  Aging has caused some stiffening in joints that wasn't there when I was in my 20's.  The chronic after effects of what I survived in the workplace, affected my balance (among other things) that also weren't there when I was in my 20s.  Getting on - and sometimes off - the lean and mean 10 speed Raleigh Grand Prix was a problem.  Once on, I could ride as long as I kept going.  The problem is there are times you have to start and stop.  After I fell off the bike in the middle of the road, I gave it up as a bad idea.

BUT ... I still wanted to ride again.  So my analytical skills went into gear.  After analyzing and getting ideas from the web, I went into the local bike shop. King Street Cycles in Uptown Waterloo.  The picture below is what we came up with to deal with both issues: training wheels for balance; a step through which we used to call a girl's bike back in the day for arthritic joints.

Definitely not lean and mean.  More like overwide, slow and wobbly.  But it got the job done.

It turns out that my mind was so fractured that I actually had to relearn to ride a bike.  I know they say that you never forget how to ride a bike; however, the mythical "they" have probably never encountered what workplace abuse plus stress can do to the human brain.  I literally had to relearn how to brake, how to turn - both directions, and how to change gears.  Thankfully there is a church in our area and I used their parking lot to regain my skills.  I also discovered that I not only could not walk in a straight line - which I already knew - but I couldn't ride in a straight line.  Which made riding on sidewalks and in bike lanes were problematic.

However, after I relearned how to ride a bike again, I needed more space than I could get within the confines of my small "hood".  I wanted to be able to go 5-10 miles a day.  I wanted to go out of the city - which isn't that far as I live three blocks within the city limits; but there were problems.  There are hills.  Anyway direction I go, there is going to be a hill.  There are busy streets.  Even the street outside my house which leads to the country is a highway which people use to go back country from one place to another.  There was fear.  There was a lack of comfort level.  So I stopped cycling.

And then

 one day I came across something called the Great Cycle Challenge  which is a fundraiser to raise funds for research for paediatric cancer for Sick Kids Hospital in Toronto.

The difference between this and other bike-a-thons, is that the participant sets their own goals, both monetary and distance.  It is done anytime throughout the month of June.  Since my physical and mental condition is still such that I can't guarantee that I'm going to be functional on any given day, a traditional bike-a-thon where you meet on a certain day at a certain time at a certain place and ride a certain amount of kilometres wasn't and still isn't going to work for me.  But this one had definite possibilities.

So I signed up.  I signed up for $50 and 50 kilometres.  I doubted I could meet either goal; however, I figured out that with a goal of $50 dollars if no one sponsored me, I could do it out of my pocket.  Within 24 hours, a friend had donated $50!  Wohoo!  I couldn't believe it.

That was the start in far away 2016 of an adventure that's still going on.

Another instalment in the office.

Stay tuned for further updates on the adventures of Suzanne on her adapted cycle.