Just got back today from a bike trip - Incheon to Busan (if unfamiliar, here is a nice report/review). Lots of ups and downs to the trip. I’ve now done this same trip, the last 3 years, each fall. There is something nice about the familiar. Each time, I notice newer things - it is like watching the same movie, over and over again. If it is “good”, it’ll show you new things each time.
This year, I wanted to do the trip in one go. But alas, life threw a few wrenches into my machinery and as my short video suggests - I also wasn’t “feeling it”. Might have been the humidity, might have just been my mind. But alas, I kept at it and got the job done. 2 days. 29 hours bike riding time.
To get to the start - it was a 5 hour bus ride north to Incheon (from where I live in Mokpo) and then a 16km ride through hellish hills, north wind, traffic through Incheon City to the start line of the bike trail. My intention was to then get a hotel and start fresh, early Sat. morning. I booked a hotel on my phone, the evening before. Got the confirmation. Bloody hell! I paid for a room that same evening! Hours later, no refund. Everyone just said, “sorry”, that’s our policy. Even though I noticed the date error, right away (and I’m still not sure it was my error).
So, when life tosses you lemons, you make a whiskey sour.
I got into Incheon at 3pm and headed north, ready to ride through the night. Screw the hotel, that was yesterday’s plan.
Alas, 2nd wrench, lights started dimming during the evening, so plugged them into my battery pack. That lasted about an hour, seems my battery pack was discharging … Finally, no lights. So around midnight, pulled into a hotel. But the tunnels were nice, those first 9 hours!
Next day, 100s of kms. I just kept going - not feeling it. Still though, graced with the beauty of apple orchards, deer jumping infront of me, snakes galore, the endless horizon of a massive river. I was a winner just for being out there.
And alas, those are my heroes. The ones who at least get out there and do IT. Whatever that IT is. This big world does not extend invitations - you got to invite yourself.
Penned a little poem to finish off. Keep going forward - even when you aren’t feeling it. You’ll arrive and be much stronger for it.
If you liked this read - you might like this other post about Unsung Heroes.
Unsung Heroes
It’s so easy to be a winner
when everyone’s applauding and
there’s a wind at your back and
you were born into it,
money, prowess, bountiful health
beauty, brains, braggadaccio.
It’s so easy to be a hero
when everything’s going your way
and the roulette wheel is always
stopping when asked and the
fat lady never wants to stop singing.
It’s so easy. Too easy.
Yet these are our heroes,
the ones that already had it made.
Give me my heroes half-baked.
Give me my heroes fallable and fragile.
Give me my heroes with warts and all.
My heroes are the ones that
on a bad day, find a way.
You see, a hero isn’t what they achieve.
It’s how they’d achieve it.
Praise be to those who
when the going gets tough,
have the stuff to keep going
and still shine.
Praise be to those who
without blessings or inheritance,
do the right things and stick at it
with all their will and might.
Praise be to those who
bite down harder when
the winds blower stronger and
who achieve despite
life’s empty bowl.
You are my hero.
The ones without gifts of any kind
the ones at the back of the class
who kept listening and kept learning
to keep the fire of a dream
burning inside.
