Gulp.
No crutches. No backup. No security woobie. David headed north up I-75 today, leaving me to either take the deep dive, or hide under the bed. Well, not one to duck the things that scare the living shit out of me, I decided it was go time! I had to fly solo now.
I pulled up the Google maps, traced out a route to one of my favorite places to visit, the hang gliding jump off point up on Lookout Mountain, just south of Chattanooga. I made sure I intentionally created a route that had me travelling mostly on small, low-speed, two lane roads (so far as I could tell during my planning stage).
I mentally rehearsed the route, where the challenges were, worked my way through how I was going to approach each them, in turn. I took precautions where I felt I could, to ease my anxiety – I made sure my gas tank was full, that I had sorted out my clothing choice to be appropriate for the temperature and speed, that I knew how to work my GPS on my phone on the handlebars of my bike, so I knew where I was going.
And with that prep in place, Viv and I set out on our epic, 30 mile, first big outing together.
We had made the next stretch, from running a couple of miles along a quiet, ridge road to riding through the busy center a small town, rode, unexpectedly on two different 4 lane roads, and managed to get up to 50 mph for the first time!!
We didn’t hit our ultimate target, Lookout Mountain, because I didn’t quite know where I was going and ended up running along the base of the mountain instead, circling back on myself before heading for home. I discovered just how exhausting it can be to pay so much attention all the time, but It was a gorgeous day, the ride was pure magic, running, now so comfortably, along the mountain ridge above Chattanooga for miles on the way back, making it back home all in one piece!! I’d call that a success!! And, WoW!! That’s addictive!!
Lessons: There’s always ways to game things in your favor for the next micro-step if you take the time to plot out the next step.
Smarter-Not-Harder U 