My New Hobby (Which Turned Out to be Lindy's Newest "Flavor of the Month") and Facing My Fears...Part 2

If you're new to my blog or you just haven't caught up lately you have to go back and read the last post for any of this one to make sense.  I'll wait while you go back and read it....  OK, now you know that my newest hobby is bicycling!!  You also learned why I am calling it Lindy's newest "flavor of the month."  The part I missed covering in the last post was facing my fears.  What does bicycling have to do with facing my fears?  Apparently, a lot, according to my husband.

I have to back up to Labor Day weekend where this story really begins, or continues, depending on your viewpoint.  Lindy and I had an actual three-day weekend with no children involved!!!  This never happens.  We sent the kids off to the other side of Missouri to see their cousins on Friday night knowing that we wouldn't see them until Monday evening.  I think it's the first time ever this has happened.  Thanks, Grammy and Papa!!  We did miss a cool Ronnin-designed kid's birthday party which is an event in itself, but we managed to survived.  Anyway, Lindy had purchased his bike the previous weekend and mine actually came in from California and was assembled on Friday.  Lindy went to pick it up and we ended up traveling around to several stores that evening to shop for bike accessories and out to dinner with my bike attached to the back of the van.  Lindy was sure he got several curious stares when he was by himself.  (You read the last post and saw the picture of my bike so you can understand why he would get a few sideways glances).  Once I was in the van with him, I just knew that people were looking at the bike, then seeing me, and saying to themselves, "There's the girl that owns that supercool bike!"  (Sometimes I make things more in my mind than they are in real life.  You do it too.  Don't fool yourself).  Anyway, we did joke about what people were saying to themselves when they looked at us.  That evening when we got home after 10:00 was the first opportunity I actually had to ride my bike, around the cul de sac in the dark.  Other than test riding bikes at bike stores I hadn't been on a bike for any length of time in 16 years.  Sixteen years, people!!  I was a little rusty.  I managed to stay on the bike.  The next evening Lindy and I rode about five miles total.  We rode to a little cafe and ate dinner.  When we walked in with our cool bike attire on and carrying our helmets there were some admiring stares and audible gasps.  (Again, I'm probably making too much of it, but I did hear people say, "Look at them.  They rode their bikes here."  That was probably the extent of their attention toward us).

The next day, Sunday, is when our adventure started.  Lindy and I decided that we needed to stay overnight somewhere on the Katy Trail and ride our bikes--a little biking adventure.  After much research, with him on his laptop and me on my iPad at the kitchen table (you already know we're nerds after reading the last post), we decided to go to Hermann after church on Sunday and stay in a bed a breakfast.  If you don't recall Labor Day or you don't live in our part of Missouri, just know that it was an absolutely picture-perfect, gorgeous weekend--weather-wise.  We drove to Hermann, walked around the downtown area (no offense to any Hermann-lovers, but Hermann has nothing on downtown St. Charles), and checked into our bed and breakfast.  We hit the Katy Trail at around 4:00 or so.  Now, keep in mind that the evening before when I rode about 5 miles was the most bicycling I had done in 16 years.  I am also not what you would call athletic, unless carrying heavy shopping bags counts.  I was a little sore already from the five miles the previous night.  So we picked a direction on the Katy Trail and started riding.  We had decided to see if we could make it to a landmark that was about 8 miles away.  That's right, people, we started the ride planning to go about 16 miles.  In my naive, bike-novice mind I must not have been thinking straight and I should have also expected that anything Lindy does he is going to push himself--and me--to do it better or farther or whatever.  That's just his nature.  The Katy Trail is little gravelly rocks--not a smooth surface.  It is a beautiful trail in that area but it felt as if we were going uphill.  We had already learned through research that the Katy Trail is "exceptionally flat."  Lindy tells me as we're traveling along that we're actually on a slight incline so we should be coasting on the way back.  It doesn't really matter how far we go because the ride back is going to be a breeze, according to him.  Since he's my husband and he's more of an outdoor person than me and he has a bike computer which I am imagining is telling him that we are headed up an incline, I persevere onward.  The picture from my last post is about 2-3 miles in to our journey.  Several miles along the route we come along a couple sitting on a bench.  We stop to chat and we mention that we're glad it will be downhill on the way back.  They give us a bit of an odd look and say that it feels like it's uphill both ways and it feels like you have a headwind both ways.  Interesting.  Undaunted, we decide--or Lindy decides--once we get to the landmark that is at the 8.2 mile mark that since we've come this far we should just see if we can go ten miles before turning around.  We did.  At the ten mile mark was a horse farm and we took these pictures so that was quite a nice little surprise.

On the way back, when we have to ride back every mile that we've already journeyed, is when the real fun began.  We're riding along and it feels the same way going back as is it did when we were outbound--like we were going uphill.  I say to Lindy, "I thought your bike computer said that we were going uphill before."  He says, "Oh, no, my bike computer doesn't have that function.  It just 'looked' to me like we were going uphill so I assumed the way back would be really easy and we would just be coasting."  Seriously? SERIOUSLY!!?  You brought me ten miles with the promise of an easy ride back and it's going to feel exactly like the ten miles out!  Needless to say, I was a little miffed at this point.  Had I been in better shape or been on a bike AT ALL prior to the last 24 hours it would not have been as big of a deal.  To make it an even better story, I fell off my bike and got a little banged up at about mile 14.  Here's a picture of that:

I learned later that Lindy had posted the nice, smiling picture of me on my bike to Facebook with the caption, "My hot wife on her new bike."  After my accident he took the picture above and posted, "My hot wife after she fell off her new bike."  So, the last six miles back were an effort in perseverance for me.  My booty was killing me, in spite of my "comfort seat" and my padded shorts.  My knee was hurting really bad and we only had water to pour on it.  My legs ached tremendously.  I was in bad shape and I had a hard time keeping up with him.  After the 20 mile journey was over, in which we argued about whether 20 miles bicycling was a big deal, I was not in a wonderful frame of mind.  We were riding for nearly three hours.  I understand that riding 20 miles to someone who bikes a lot is a piece of cake, but to me, in my condition, it was way too much.

We found a restaurant that was open and ended up waiting until almost 9:00 to eat.  We're still in our bike attire and I have a visible limp from my knee and yet undiscovered golf ball-sized bruise on my hip.  The next morning I was so sore I could barely move but the purpose of our trip was to ride our bikes, right??  So we went back to the same place and took off in the other direction.  So ensued much debate and arguing about how far we should go.  Lindy said if I would just keep at it I would work the soreness out.  At that point it wasn't happening.  We only rode about three miles before I told him I wanted to go back, which gave us only a 6 mile ride that morning.  Needless to say, we were not in a happy place with each other.  This is where the rubber hit the road, literally, and the truth started to come out.

Lindy notices that I seem really nervous and fearful on my bike.  This is where it stinks sometimes to be married so long to someone that they can tell what you're thinking and then call you on it.  He said I was so focused on analyzing the trail and looking for any obstructions and judging which was the best part of the path and staying far enough away from his bike and avoiding having another wreck and trying to look forward and not letting my attention stray from anything other than the trail...that I wasn't having any fun at all.  I was fearful and not allowing myself to enjoy any part of of it.  I hate it when he's right.  He was right.  I was absolutely doing all of the above in addition to being focused on my sore knee and sore bum and sore legs.  As we finished the ride and loaded our bikes and began the trip home the discussion, or counseling session, continued.  This is where the good and challenging part of being married to a pastor comes in.  Part of his job is counseling, and while I don't know most details of who he counsels and what he counsels them about; the one thing I do know is that he will tell you the truth.  He is not a sugar-coater.  He will not tell you something just because he thinks it's what you want to hear.  So, fair warning friends, if you seek out my pastor-husband for counseling be prepared to hear the truth.  His approach might vary from one person and personality to another, but he will still tell you the truth about yourself and your situation.  I know this from personal experience.

So, during this counseling session journeying from Hermann to home, he isolates my fears to outdoor activities.  Right again.  It does seem that I have a lot of fear about outdoor activities.  I've basically given up snow skiing and one of the main reasons is because of my fear of heights.  Standing at the top of the mountain and realizing I have to get to the bottom is alarming to me.  Lindy doesn't get that because my feet are planted on the ground the whole time.  It's not like I'm suspended in the air.  I also don't care for softball/baseball/dodgeball because I don't like the idea of possibly getting hit by a ball.  I'll cover my face with my glove before I dive to catch a softball that comes near me.  I got singled out in 4th grade by my teacher because I pretended to get hit by the dodgeball so I could sit out of the game.  Whoever invented a game where the idea is to just hit someone with a ball was crazy, in my opinion.  I'm not sure where I came by these fears.  My brother is one of the most fearless people I know and we grew up in the same house.  He did all kinds of crazy stuff.  I did remind Lindy in the midst of this session that he is fearful of the open-MRI machine and requires Xanax and me holding his hand to cope with the situation.  His defense there is that having an MRI doesn't interfere with his everyday life.

So, what was his solution for me?  He said that when you have fear there are only two options to get over it, "face it or pray it."  He asked me what was the most fearful thing I could ever think of doing.  After a moment, I said, "bungee jumping."  He says, "Then, that's what you should do.  Go bungee jumping!!"  Yeah, right.  I told him I was picking the "pray it" solution.  After further consideration a few days later, I decided that actually the most fearful thing I can think of doing is being in a room full of snakes, Indiana Jones-style.  Yeah, that's not happening.

I appreciate my husband for being one of the few people in my life who tell me the truth about myself.  Most people are too nice or too respectful to really tell you the truth--at least they are with me.  When you're a pastor's wife and you supervise the majority of the people that you work with in your Monday through Friday job, you can maybe count on  2-3 people in your life who will really be honest with you.   If you think about it, it's probably the same with you.  Most people don't have an abundance of people around them who feel comfortable enough or are intimate enough to really let you know the hard, uncomfortable truth in love.  If you have more than 2-3 then you are truly blessed.

On a lighter note, I counted on my friend, Bridget, to tell me if I had something in my teeth or if I was having a wardrobe malfunction, but she works in a different office now.  By the way, if I have something in my teeth please tell me.

I have decided to pray about my fears, and over the last 6 weeks or so, I have gotten more comfortable on my bike and I really enjoy it.  We try to ride as a family at least a couple times a week and even last night we rode 5.5 miles.  Lindy is still very much enjoying this "flavor" so I'm glad for that.  Our friends, Matt and Jenn, are jumping on the bike train and they picked up their bikes from the bike shop the other night!!  We can't wait to ride with them.  Lindy is also riding with friends and with the boys.  I hope this just continues on and on.

The positive side of riding 20 miles in one outing and 31 miles in one weekend is that anything less seems totally doable.  That was the gift that the 20 mile ride gave me, along with the honesty of my pastor-husband about things that I needed to hear.  By the way, I am one of his 2-3 people who are honest with him, but my blog isn't the place where I air his dirty laundry--just mine.

My prayer for you is that you find those 2-3 people who are willing to be honest with you, if you don't have them already, and that you deal with any fears you may have--by either facing it or praying it.  We're scheduled to go skiing in Vermont in February so I'm sure I'll report back about whether I skied or stayed in the lodge reading a book--which happens to be just as enjoyable to me.

Have a wonderful weekend.  :)

My New Hobby (Which Turned Out to Be Lindy's Newest "Flavor of the Month") and Facing My Fears

I wish it hadn't been so long since I've actually had the chance to sit down and write but the past five weeks or so have been completely nuts.  I've been out of town three times--all for pleasure--have been crazy busy at work, and have had lots of other fun stuff to do.  My new hobby is also taking up some of my time, which I don't mind, but all of this crazy busyness has gotten in the way of my writing.  Anyway, onward.

So what is my new hobby that has turned out to be Lindy's newest "flavor of the month?"  (I promise I will explain what is meant by the whole "flavor of the month" thing).  Most people who are in my real, every day life have seen the photographic evidence, others on Facebook have been subjected to the same photographic evidence, now it's time to go public.  I got a new bike!!!!  Here she is pictured below with me.  Isn't she pretty?

Her name is "Jenny."  That's right.  She has a name but I didn't name her.  Long story short, I had decided I wanted to get a bike so that I could combine exercise with spending time with my boys.  I have real issues with exercise and they go like this:  1)  I don't like to get up before the crack of dawn to exercise before work since I already have to get up at 6:00.  2)  I don't want to join a gym because I work and that just takes more time away from my family.  3)  I haven't been able to run since I was 15 and had a hairline fracture in my left ankle.  (I know all you die hard runners are laughing right now and it honestly is probably an excuse at this point).  4)  I would rather watch paint dry than to actually walk for exercise.  I am a tremendous multi-tasker and so to walk just to walk is almost unbearable to me.  I can't hardly watch television without folding a load of laundry or making a grocery list.  So, bicycling turned out to be something I thought I could do that would serve more than one purpose and I don't mind adding things to my life that have multiple functions.

So, the search for the right bike began.  If you know Lindy and me,  you know that we are both researchers, and since he loves research for the sake of research he was right in there with me.  He was also ready for a new "flavor of the month" so I wasn't surprised that he was right there with me.  We went to numerous bike shops, we searched the internet, we compared bike styles and functions, we sat in our loft area with me on the desktop computer and him on the laptop reading reviews aloud to each other.  (Isn't this insight into our exciting lives just absolutely thrilling)?!!  I knew already that I wanted a "comfort bike" with a large seat.  That's part of the reason I wouldn't ride the mountain bike that had been housed comfortably in our garage for the last 17 or so years.  I wanted a bigger seat and I knew I wasn't planning on actually "mountain biking" or bike racing so I found the perfect, beautiful bike for me.  (I am fully aware, Gia, that real cyclists will not take me seriously and I'm OK with that).  The picture doesn't do it justice.  It's turquoise with pink and white polka-dots.  It also has a white seat with daisies on it and pink spokes and a bell and...it is just so cool and, apparently so Robin!!  No lie, after I got it I had neighbors and strangers alike wanting to know how to get a bike like mine, test riding it, etc.  Even my gun-toting, deer-hunting neighbor climbed aboard and took her for a spin.  He even rang the bell!!  His wife and I were so wishing it hadn't been dark already so that we could have gotten pictures.  OK, I digress.  My bike is made by the company "Electra" which is out of California and I had to order my bike.  Honestly, they just don't have many beach cruisers in the middle of the country and each bike store has only one or two for you to even test drive.  I'm not going to go into the technology that makes my bike special, but you should know that it comes in like 15-20 different styles.  Mine happens to be called the "Jenny."

How does Lindy's newest "flavor of the month" play into all this?  Here's some further insight into my husband.  He gets bored easily.  Fortunately, he hasn't gotten bored with me or with his vocation, but other than that if he isn't learning something or trying something new or finding a new hobby to get involved in then he gets bored.  He doesn't like to read fiction like I do.  He wants to read something of substance that teaches him something.  He doesn't even like to read my blog unless it's about him or unless I include some lesson to be learned.  If I tried to list all of the hobbies and interests he's had over the years I've known him, it would be a list longer than my arm so here are the ones that have actually stuck with him:  Computers, skiing, gardening, and hopefully now, biking.  We've also gotten involved in various MLM adventures through the years like New Image vitamins (that one was actually me), Mona Vie, Visalus, etc.  He has gone through the phase several times of wanting to get involved in investing in real estate.  Each time a new flavor has come along to steal his attention away before he actually pulls the trigger on any houses (how's that for mixed metaphors), but I expect that one day we will own more than just our house and a timeshare.  The problem with the man, and you'll think I'm exaggerating here, is that he is just so talented that once he feels like he's learned something and mastered it he loses interest.  A little of that has rubbed off on me over the years, not the talented part, but having to master something.  When we were newly married a flavor of the month for him at that time was playing Tetris on the computer.  (We didn't have kids.  We had time to play games on the computer).  I had never even heard of Tetris but I wanted to learn to play so he taught me.  I became obsessed with getting better at it than him and so I played...a lot...until I had wiped out all ten of his top ten scores.  To this day, I don't think there's been anything else where I have actually been able to beat him.  Now I realize that by the time I was able to get good enough to wipe out his top ten he had already moved on to the next thing and left Tetris in the dust.  That realization just dawned on me as I'm typing this and I find that to be really funny.  Honestly, I wouldn't have Lindy any other way.  I wish I had some of the money back from flavors that didn't last very long, but I appreciate his need to be challenged.  He only had trumpet lessons as a kid.  He taught himself to play the drums, the guitar, and the bass guitar and those have stuck with him too.  He took piano in college, but didn't do well with that instrument.  He can play one song on the piano:  "Almost Paradise" from the movie "Footloose."  Don't ask me why because I don't know.  He's pretty amazing, but I guess I'm partial.

Anyway, once I got interested in buying a bike, and full disclosure here, I did tell Lindy that I would like for him to have a bike too so that we could ride as a family; he was ALL IN.  And when I say that Lindy is "all in" I mean that he is committed and he is going to have every accessory known to man to accommodate his new hobby.  So, as we settled on buying my bike from our friend, Bill, at the bike shop where he works, Lindy settled on the bike he wanted.  (Bill is married to my dear friend and employee of 11 years, Margaret).  You won't be surprised when I tell  you that we bought Lindy's bike and brought it home before my bike was even officially ordered.  Also, that day we bought a bike rack that holds four bikes for the back of the van.  That was a necessity.  Later that day...you knew there was more to this story, didn't you...Lindy was "adjusting" Jac's very-good-quality Honda bike that we realized was not adjusted well for him (we're bike people now after all, we know how to fit a person on a bike).  As Lindy took it on a little test spin he somehow ended up bending the frame.  The chain fell off and something else happened, I'm not sure.  It's all a blur right now.  Anyway, I ended up going to the pool (this was the last weekend in August) and off went Jac and Lindy to the bike store.  Of course, they called me while I was poolside and said that Jac's bike couldn't be fixed so Jac was getting a new bike.  This was fully expected by me.  Also, in the midst of all of this bicycle adjusting, Lindy realizes that ETHAN'S bike is too small.  Ethan needs a new bike now.  Back to the store they went (this was a few days later) and now Ethan has a new bike.  Gavin didn't get a new bike but he has learned to ride without training wheels since the last time I blogged.  Yea, Gav!!!  So, we are a cycling family.  Did I mention Lindy and his bike accessories?  I really shouldn't make fun of anyone else and their accessorizing, now should I?  But, I will anyway.  Granted, his birthday occurred in the midst of bikeapallooza, so I told him he could get a bike computer.  He picked one out and it tells you the speed, how far you've traveled, how long you've actually ridden on the bike, etc.  We all also have helmets, of course, he and the boys have the water bottle holders and water bottles from the bike shop, he has a black carrying case for the front of his bike, we both have bike jerseys and padded bike shorts.  Need I go on?  Oh, I also ordered a pretty white basket for the front of my bike but it hasn't come in yet.  Anyway, we are having much fun with bicycling and I honestly hope that this flavor of the month sticks.  It's good exercise, we can all ride together as a family, Lindy can ride with his friends, etc.

I mentioned in the title of this post that it would also be about facing my fears, but due to the length of this current  post, I'm going to make that discussion Part II.  So, you'll have to return later to read about what kind of fear I'm talking about, the equally good and challenging part of being married to someone who counsels others as part of his vocation, and the continued saga of bikeapallooza.  Hope you've enjoyed Part I.