My scabs have finally peeled away. All I have are pale spots and slashes of what recently was.
Last Saturday, me and the boys made a drive up north to Mt. Pinos. They had been talking for months about taking bikes up the mountain and then bombing down in full armor and of the dives they'd taken and how I should come and see it and feel it and take it on. When my car broke down, I bought a bike that could handle that sort of excursion and then we went. And then there was snow. I knew that no matter what was going to come was just going to come, because fear or anticipation are by the day becoming useless traits to me. I remember thinking something like, fuck we're really doing this, before we dropped into the first trail and then I remember just hanging on. It was fast and rugged and I was such a rook to these flying maniacs, but they took me through. The first run, I rode a lot of brake. The second, considerably less. There's a fucked up drop in on the second of three paths that takes a lot of faith, especially for a kid who had both never seen it and was scared to hell of heights - also the cause of the great closing wreck to the following video. I remember dropping through and then thinking I'd be alright. I took my first dive into a patch of thorn bushes and survived it and loved it and then remember thinking I'd be alright.
We rode until the sun was setting, until a rider we passed said something like, if you guys go down that trail again it's frostbite for sure...before we rode the trail again, until the sun set, until we couldn't even see the damn trail anymore. We packed up, hit some bottom of the hill pizza joint, drank some hot chocolate and drove home. At some point, I pulled a thorn from my leg that was at least a quarter inch inside. It felt fitting, and even one week away, it still feels like a damn good day.
Esh even let me pick the music...
