The lies we tell ourselves

I can't decide if I am lying to myself or using the power of positive thinking.

Adrian and I rode 140 miles this weekend in our first test ride for our tour. We packed all our gear onto our bikes and camped all weekend long. Even though we were not on our actual tour, we acted as though we were. Did we pack enough oatmeal? Can we really use a rock to hammer tent spikes into the ground? How many days can we go without a shower? You get the point.

This weekend is the first time I caught myself asking, "Is this going to be fun?"

We have it easy in Southern California. It was cold last weekend. And by cold, I mean I thought about actually zipping up my sleeping bag at night. It was so cold I had to put on 3/4 pants when the sun set.

And between the 13 hours of biking Saturday and Sunday, I put my brain to work considering how difficult this weekend could have been if it had been r...um, if it had been ra.... Shoot! If that stuff had started to fall from the sky.

The "R Word."

The thing that makes grass green in Oregon.

Rain.

We woke up tired and achy in the morning. One of us would have made breakfast (if we had remembered to pack oatmeal and secure our matches in a dry place) while the other packed up the tent, dirty biking shorts, wet towels, stinky socks and bruised bananas. Then we biked. For six, seven hours in a row. And then while one of us shops for food for dinner the other sets up camp, hangs the moist socks, organizes dirty gear, changes flat tires.

We will do that for 18 straight days. It may drive me straight to insanity. But I keep telling myself that the Oregon coastline will motivate me. That spending days listening to nature rather than neighbors will invigorate me. That the accomplishment of climbing Big Sur with 50 pounds of gear on my two-wheel commuter will propel me all the way home.

I just hope that's not a lie.