OVERHEARING ADVENTURE

Not long ago several folks were sitting around the glass table in our living room.  We had just finished Compline--an ancient prayer that "completes the day" and we were quietly carrying on smaller conversations among ourselves.

So, Justin, are you ready to hit the ribboned roads of North Dakota this August?   Turns out, Justin was more readier than me.  He'd already pedaled up and down the trails around Spokane, logged numerous miles in training, and had upgraded from a hybrid mountainbike to a Greenspeed Trike.  What we weren't aware at first, was that another pair of ears were honed in nearby, a third party was listening on the edge of our conversation.  The conversation eventually drifted into future tours--like a 2020 tour of Cuba and a possible 2021 TranSiberian tour across Russia and China.

I'll go with you! 

We both turned toward the third party and 15 year old Elliott smiled back.  He wanted us to know that he was all in on bicycle-touring to exotic places.  Elliott's mom blushed a bit at her son's unbridled outburst and tried to affirm the boldness of her son's enthusiasm laced with a mild caution that only mom's can deliver with effectiveness.   

 Well, Elliott, that would take A LOT of work and training . . . and visas . . . and funding.  Such matronly wisdom would normally work to diffuse such unchecked enthusiasm, but Elliott took that as a speech for.  I'm sure he took in this cautionary advice yet his eyes dazed off somewhere just north of Mongolia.

My turn.  So Elliott, what about you go riding next week on the Centennial Trail with Justin and me?  That's about twenty miles . . . that might be a good first, small step to take.  Clearly, that would be a speech against.  OK, Mr. Hall, I'm in.  Let's do it . . . Cuba, can you believe it!  So it happened that a third team member, 15-year-old Elliott came on board.

More about unbridled enthusiasm in the next blog, but our third party Elliott reminded us once again, that having passion for something is a critical part of life and that passion is the first step toward accomplishing any noble and adventurous undertaking.

Elliott and Justin attaching
a rack to an E-bike.