Backwards

 We love this house.

23 July 2014

On Saturday, Tom led his Califon route "backwards," meaning that we climbed several hills I have not felt the need to climb. The first was Black River Road.  The second was Hoffman's Crossing. They were both work, but neither was as odious as they appear to be when one is descending at speed, gripping the breaks for fear of landing in the Raritan or a tributary thereof.

We were one ridge east of Schooley's Mountain when we stopped for a break at a Krauszer's.  I went for a pureed frozen mocha.  Cheryl was sure it would freeze my stomach, and therefore my legs, when we got going again.  It didn't, so that's one more thing I know I can eat on a long ride.

Not long after we got going again, Plain Jim and Winter Larry, riding next to each other directly in front of me, burst into song:

I'm disturbed

We're disturbed, we're disturbed

We're the most disturbed

Like we're psychologically disturbed

Hear ye, hear ye

In the opinion of this court

This child is depraved on account

He ain't had a normal home

Hey, I'm depraved

On account I'm deprived

So take him to a headshrinker

My daddy beats my mommy, my mommy clobbers me

My grandpa is a commie, my grandma pushes tea

My sister wears a mustache, my brother wears a dress

Goodness gracious, that's why I'm a mess

Yes, Officer Krupke, he shouldn't be here

This boy don't need a couch, he needs a useful career

Society's played him a terrible trick

And sociologically he's sick

I am sick

We are sick, we are sick

We are sick, sick, sick

Like we're sociologically sick

"Westside Story!"  Larry explained.  "Officer Krupke!" Jim added, and spelled it for me.

The haul up Hoffman's Crossing was rewarded by the triple descent of Suttons, Guinea Hollow, and Rockaway Roads.

I don't remember when my first trip up Rockaway Road was.  John S probably took us there on one of his legendary "Which Way, John?" routes that had me lost the minute we left the parking lot.

Since then I've learned the roads of Hunterdon County, and since then I go out of my way to be on Rockaway Road if my route takes me within a few miles of it.

There's one trip up that always sticks in my mind, from March 2009.  It was just me, Cheryl, and Mike B, several days after I learned that I was being forced out of yet another lab due to lack of money.  As we started up the gradual hill, I found myself deep in thought and a little ahead of my friends.  What was I going to do with my life?  Did I want to stay in science?  Could I stand being low-life techie scum for the rest of my career?  Was it even a career?  What else could I possibly do?  What other skills did I have?

Here it is, July 2014, and that experience was two labs ago. As I let Miss Piggy wind out along the wooded road, I assessed my situation, as I always do when I'm here.  Yesterday marked the day I tied for the second longest I'd worked in any lab. Not only that, but this is the longest I've ever gone without surfing over to the university's open positions page, the longest I've ever gone without pondering a jump, the longest I've ever gone being happy.

It was around this time that Jim caught up with me.  "Does it count as the Macho Mile if it's a woman ahead of the pack?"  So I explained my strange elation and all was understood.

We stopped to take pictures of The House, for sale again, or still.  It's different every time.

On the drive home, I detoured to the lab to check on a pair of mice that I'd done brain surgery on two days before. I hoped they'd look and smell better than I looked and smelled. They did.

I was slightly less than refreshed when I woke up the next morning, but I had energy enough to push Kermit through a little headwind from home to Blackwells Mills to meet Plain Jim, TEW, and John S for Jim's D ride to Main Street in Kingston.  

Y'know, it took the leisurely pace down Canal Road to make me realize that I'm always pushing, always, when I'm on my bike.  I'm never pushing myself to the edge; I'm never going as fast as I can.  But I'm always pushing in one way or another.  If it's not up a hill or to keep the pace or to get to a ride start in plenty of time, it's distance, or worthless competition with my own average commuting speed on the way to the lab. And on Sunday, as John and I talked about possible routes along the northern reaches of the Delaware River, as TEW and I talked about the whales she saw in Alaska, as other bikers whizzed past us, as I looked over at the raft of plants floating along the edge of the D&R Canal, I wasn't pushing at all, and it was perfect.  I knew full well that most of my flatland buddies were, at that very moment, setting some new speed record on Gary W's Etra ride, and that, by all logic, I ought to have been out there with them, "improving" myself.

Pah.

I used my phone's camera for these farm pictures on Canal Road:

Jim, TEW, and Susan (who caught up with us on the canal) headed back to Blackwells Mills after our rest stop.  John went north, back to his house in Metuchen.  I went to the lab, to check on my mice again.

I kept my cycling shoes on when I went into the animal colony.  In the animal rooms we wear a different sort of bootie:

Kermit waited for me in my office:

Two more years here and I will tie for the longest I've worked anywhere. I can't control the money, but I can control myself.