{"id":16,"date":"2009-08-14T14:01:44","date_gmt":"2009-08-14T19:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/2link.ca\/blog\/2009\/08\/14\/just-sunshine-wind-and-speed\/"},"modified":"2009-08-14T14:01:44","modified_gmt":"2009-08-14T19:01:44","slug":"just-sunshine-wind-and-speed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.2link.ca\/newblog\/2009\/08\/14\/just-sunshine-wind-and-speed\/","title":{"rendered":"Just sunshine, wind and speed"},"content":{"rendered":"

If one reads my blog would be left with the idea that all I do is bitching\u2026 and it would an approximately correct impression. I wish I was blind, I wish I could simply enjoy life and not care what other people do or think\u2026 but that would just not be me. I always envied and blamed my father for having a quality that enhanced his life: being oblivious at everything that went around him. He would tell me often \u201cWhy do you get in fights with your mom? Can\u2019t you just do like me: get a face appropriate with the topic, nod and just think about your projects and things you want to accomplish<\/em>?\u201d Well, the answer is NO<\/strong>. Now I know why \u2013 he probably has Asperger Syndrome, just like my son \u2013 and what he thought it was a developed trait it\u2019s an inborn one. The only solution for me to be like him would be living on a desert island\u2026 and, with my luck, probably dying of appendicitis or something trivial, before I can get to a doctor. And yes \u2013 I used to blame him for withdrawing in his inner mind and letting me to deal alone with my mother\u2019s nagging and dissatisfaction.
\nBut no more bitching! Life is \u2013 as I often describe \u2013 interesting. No, you \u201cshinny happy people\u201d it\u2019s not beautiful \u2013 sometimes is sad, other times is tumultuous, in spots is dramatic or happy\u2026 but it\u2019s damn interesting.
\nRecently, as most of my friends know, I purchased a motorcycle. I had some money I was getting back from a credit card, the time is right and prices were very convenient, motorcycles attract women and I am a single dude\u2026 so I didn\u2019t honestly was on the edge of my seat due to impatience. I was thinking also about all the hassle for the rider\u2019s license, high-insurance for a new rider so I had my doubts. You imagine my doubts when, after a break of 13 years from the last time I rode, I had to take my new motorcycle home \u2013 I was yellow with fear, spun around a close-by parking lot until people thought I was crazy. But then it all came back to me\u2026 from the mist of my lost youth (don\u2019t tell me that you found it!) the joy, the exhilaration of being in the wide open, fighting the wind, leaning in curves\u2026 I find it hard to describe the happiness that after just 1-2 days dawned onto me.
\nI was amazed how a simple object \u2013 I never believed in buying happiness \u2013 could bring so much pleasure, confidence in what is and what will be, and sheer happiness. When I sold my motorcycle \u2013 I think it was 98 \u2013 it was just like all my dreams of adventure, of open spaces, of the world being my shell had ended. I remember that when my ex would try to talk me into having a child I would tell her: \u201cThere is no 3rd seat on the motorcycle<\/em>\u201d\u2026 and then I would bend under the burden of my selfishness. And yet I sold it for all the correct reasons: I am a married man, I can\u2019t kill myself, it\u2019s not practical, it\u2019s not comfortable. When I came to Canada, I flirted somewhat with the idea\u2026 but then I gave up. I used to joke (somewhat bitterly): \u201cYou know how I figured out that I am getting old? When I came to Canada my wish-list was: 1. Motorcycle; 2. Boat. Then I thought about the wind, the rain, the hassle\u2026 and I compared with the tranquility of the boat on an empty lake\u2026 and the new order has become: 1. Boat, 2. Motorcycle<\/em>\u201d. If I was true then, maybe it\u2019s true now and maybe I found the perfect time-travel machine: the motorcycle. When I zoom across empty roads, my mind takes me back to the University\u2019s campus where friends and I used to loiter on a fence and watch the spring wind blow up the girls\u2019 skirts\u2026 It takes me back to a time where there were no deadlines, no real obligations or responsibilities. And then I leave the city and get in the middle of nowhere and the cool evening sends in my helmet the smell of \u201csinziiene\u201d \u2013 flowers my grandfather had in the country side\u2026 and of dung\u2026 In a blink of an eye I am back to my childhood and all those enormous days of summer that ended in a story and listening to politics on a radio with lamps. And these memories are more like feelings than thoughts because I have to stay focused on the road ahead, scouring for rocks or potholes or some animal that might came out the woods.
\nIf somebody thinks that I made a bad investment, think how much you would be willing to spend to be young again?! It\u2019s all there, bottled in that V2 engine and it gets released into my body as I\u2019m sprinting amidst the orange shadows of the sunset.
\nYes, it\u2019s true that after 1h of riding my buttocks are starting to get numb, I have a stabbing pain in my back but I simply cannot thing about them.
\nI am simply happy again. Not as happy as I could be if everything would be perfect in my life but enough to make days at least bearable if not even more enjoyable. I normally go to bed late and wake relatively early and that makes me somewhat grumpy. Now I am going to work with a smile on my face because I get to ride my motorcycle (although the morning rush can be quite unnerving).
\nMany people are asking me \u201cAren\u2019t you afraid? So many accidents<\/em>\u201d. I am afraid \u2013 less now that when I purchased it but still the anxiety is somewhat high. Still, I ask rhetorical \u2013 why do only things that you are comfortable with? How can we become with new things, feelings, actions if we don\u2019t experience them ever? I like challenges. Just like I love to do only complicated, presumably impossible things in my job, I also try to face any fear that my mind or my body flutters in me.
\nYes, I am aware it\u2019s still early to make long-term judgments. It might be that in 1-2 years the rain, the cold, the insurance or even a wipeout, would show me that motorcycle is not really for me. But then I will be able to lay in its grave my youth dream without regrets, love it and remember it if for what it was \u2013 a whim of crazy youth \u2013 instead of carrying it inside me as a frustration: oh, I could have been so happy if only I had the guts\/the money\/the X to do it.
\nI\u2019m going back on my steps and maybe it\u2019s not so wrong to look for happiness in things. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If one reads my blog would be left with the idea that all I do is bitching\u2026 and it would an approximately correct impression. I wish I was blind, I wish I could simply enjoy life and not care what other people do or think\u2026 but that would just not be me. I always envied…<\/span><\/p>\n

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