Riding in the Rain

Sure, I’ve been caught out in the rain on my bicycle, and considered the event an unfortunate accident. Something to learn from. Something not smart. Something sane people avoid.

And yet, over the last three days, I willingly rode many hours in the rain. Sometimes a happy, mildly irritating rain. Sometimes a steady rain – like a yappy little dog biting at your ankle. And sometimes a deluge – and you are bathing in rain – like how you feel after overeating at Thanksgiving.

So, I ask myself: is something wrong with me? Is something wrong with the other 30-some people doing the same thing? Willingly venturing forth into the rain – are we nuts?

The answer is no. No, we are not nuts. Twisted? Maybe…a little. Dysfunctional? I like to think we put the funk in dysfunctional. We are a different sort of people, to be sure. A breed of people who endure a hardship because there is a quiet satisfaction for having done so. We want to see new things. Sometimes, to see a thing you’ve never seen before, you have to do a thing you’ve never done before.