Today was the first day of my grand 2021 bicycle adventure. I haven’t talked much about it in this space, but it’s been in the planning stages for quite a while. For posterity’s sake, I will run down the bare facts: about 2 weeks ago I did, in fact, quit my job at Apple. Monday - I guess that’s yesterday, holy crap that seems like a long time ago - was my last day. I drove all the way down to Sunnyvale, to an office I’d never worked at, to a desk I sat at exactly once, and dropped off my computers, made a phone call to Cassie, ate at the mediocre company cafeteria, and left exactly as I came - as a ghost. There’s not much to say about my time at Apple, and I guess that’s sorta the point. Today, at 7 am, I hopped on a plane headed to the East Coast. I landed at 5:39 in Virginia, where I met my friend Michael Struble who chatted with me while he vaped and I put together my bike so he could grab my empty box and store it for me. Then I rode about 20 miles, chasing daylight up into the rural Virginia hills to stay at a hostel way out in the middle of nowhere. I’ll be meeting up with the Bike the US for MS folks, riding about 5 days in Virginia, then heading to Scotland - assuming I pass my Covid tests - for 9 days of riding out there, then a quick trip to Disney, followed by Walnut Creek for 2 days, then Bend, Portland, Vancouver, and finally school.
I wish I had some really intelligent thing to say right now, something pithy. Riding up here was hard, and rewarding. I got super sweaty and ended up in the dark. In the old days, rides like these built up my confidence. But I have that confidence now, at least about this sort of adventure. The kind of adventure I really want to have now is a quieter one, I’ve realized, full of kids and dogs and settling down. That isn’t to say I’m not looking forward to this, but it’s different this time. I’ve come full circle from the very first time I rode out of that place at 1970 Hayes into the Kerouac unknown. I don’t feel the call of the wild so much.
Anyway, rural Virginia is very very green, quite hot, pretty humid and super hilly. It’s pretty, and I can’t wait to meet my friends.
