look outside, and there is a dazzling blue, stetching across the sky as far as the eye can see. even with other artificial blues, even it’s psuedo-reflected glory upon water is nothing to match what stetches before me now, complimenting and contrasting everything else that is out past this pane of glass.

my own type of blue is waiting at the ready. it is chipped, dented, scratched, yet gleaming after rubbing some accumulated grime off of it. it awaits me, sitting at the door like a dog who knows it is time to go outside. ready, willing, and able.

i can’t believe how long vern has lasted me, but i can’t see any reason he would ever break. i think he’s ok with leaving the century rides to jules these days, as one century training summer was probably enough for him. the spirit is still there though, looking to conquer hills and scream down them with wild abandon. jump the curb, hit that pothole, run over that branch, it matters not, it isn’t the first time it’s happened.

all that matters is that ability to get out, to move, to go, to realize and fulfill. that something that feels so elusive until it’s gone. that something that is a part everything you can ever imagine. that something that is unnamed because it doesn’t need one. ponder it, dismiss it, grant it dichotomy that you can barely fathom.

be.

I kinda like the fact that summer is so ridiculously busy , that i don’t really come here that often. in fact, it feels kinda weird typing right now, since i haven’t really put together more than a couple of sentences together in awhile. but no matter, it’s not that difficult to get back on the bike again. i think i’m trying to avoid talking about my grandma to myself anyways, as she isn’t doing so great these days. i’m pretty sure i know how i feel about that anyways.

i wonder though, is this resignation or contentment? i’m not sure if i can tell the difference right now. but part of me doesn’t want to know, because if i did know, i’d have to do something about it. right now, i can handle not dealing with too much, and just handle it as it comes. there’s enough distraction everywhere to keep me plenty occupied.

i guess it’s pretty shallow, but it’s enough to get me by. i like being busy anyways, and i don’t think it’s costing my soul anything right now. i can’t be sure though, as i can’t really define the terms, nor feel a need to do so.

it’s just summertime manglin’, where introspection is put on hiatis. where heat, sunshine, and extended periods of sunlight are more than enough to keep you distracted, and happy.

i think i probably just haven’t gotten out of the school year cycle, and right now, i am on summer break.

man, resting really takes on a different feeling after doing something crazy like riding back to back century rides.

i feel super relaxed today, as well i should after riding the STP over the weekend. three years running now, with this year being difficult still, but not as bad as last year, and definatley not as bad as the year before.

who knows with distances getting easier and easier every year, i might still surprise myself some year and do the thing in a single day. that would be rad.

not much to write about, i think i just need to at least get something out every week or so to let my future self know that everything was allright during this particualr period of time. so when he circularly checks back on past times, there will be something there, besides the void.

but it’s so nice out, and i feel exhausted. too exhausted to write, really, with way too much going on at work to really want to focus on anything afterwards or before. i wonder if allergies can have that much effect on me. i don’t really have the watery eyes or clogged sinus much anymore, but my body still feels laden with weight, and my brain feels like it has to be slowly coaxed out of the rat hole it found in the basement to scurry into. only with the right kind of cheese can i get him to even pop his head out and maybe think about considering coming out of the dark.

because if i can get him out of the dark, into the light, then that would be something. i’d shake my brain’s pituitary gland and say “thanks for making it on this fine day” and would hand him the key to the city, along with a huge pair of novelty scissors to cut the ribbon in front of the multi-million dollar complex attributed to something very fuzzy, warm, nice, and generally helpful in the societal sense. we would tour this facility, brain and i, and we would point out all the exciting things that were going to happen in the future with this building. the lives altered forever for the better, dragging people who don’t know any better onto the path of the righteous and truth.

it would be a very fine day, and we would go for a stroll outside on the yard of this particular facility and marvel at the grand engineering that went into making the building look so modern, yet such a throw back at the very same time. with awe and wonder we would gaze upon that which we had a huge hand in creating, even though both of us really have no idea what it will ultimately end up doing, improving, or impacting. it just has a good feeling about it, with good people involved.

we’d laugh some about the grounds that seem so immaculate, and wrap up our tour by going to get a few beers and talking about the old times until the wee hours of the morning, and with an appropriate stretch and yawn, we would go our separate ways, to our respective beds, to sleep the deep sleep of alcohol stupor, and dream of nothing.

ahhh, summer feels like it is here. even the cloudy days are warm, and riding is a joy.

i just want to be outside.

something just struck me recently. i guess it just hit me before i started writing this. i feel like this blog has a quality that questions what i can get out of this life, as opposed to what i can offer it. i mean, as i think about it, i sit typing this on a computer that took a couple of decades to bring to this level, listening to music through the same media that took even longer to fulfill.

strange, huh? i mean, think about it. the timeline that creates many of the things that are great about the time i live in, and have a small amount of control over, are created by others, in a very specific manner. i am involved just by paying attention. it feels like everyone is vying for that attention, but alot of it is very focused in a way i would like it to be.

i suppose if i don’t have a sense of what i want by this age, do i deserve to have a choice anymore? should it reach a threshold where i don’t have control anymore and is thusly deposited to those that are more apt than i? i personally don’t think that i should have a time limit, but i think everyone else might thrive on that type of shit. but everyone else is really that final frontier, and that adds more than a few dimensions.

you know, with so many people around me at all times, capable of making so many complex decisions, why should i ever have to make one? it’s an interesting if almost improbable decision to consider. with the amount of control i am surrounded by on all fronts, it would be so easy to surrender.

complete, utter, surrender. take the person i know and remove them from the decision making process. leave them to play where they want somewhere else, away from the influence of some other parallel but uninvolved reality. because if the standard is so easily established by none other than yours truly, then i would be set.

but is it surrender? i think there is a internal logarithmic curve stretching from some arbitrary surface of consciousness, to its very inner core. but it is not an arbitrary surface because that same x-axis stretches from one end to the other in the same units. that must be the arbitrary part though. or trying to decide which part is approaching infinity. or what the hell the y-axis is.

am i at a point where i can fool around with these barriers, these limits? not in the conceptual, projected future thinking, but the complete surrender, complete acceptance, inevitability of thoughts that have occured so many times as to think they weren’t noticeable until they were impossible to ignore.

i don’t know, because it couldn’t be an active decision. i couldn’t be going crazy if i thought i was.
but i could surrender.

but i can’t. because it would be too easy. because i already know what would happen. because i can’t ignore all the holes. because i’m too interested in what happens next. because i am in control. because this is something so amazingly special. because i am who i am. because. and that’s about what it boils down to.

and so i sit in debt to all the people who created this moment so i could express this idea, right now. this is one of a million possible climaxes that could make all the difference in the world. all i can offer this life is this, i suppose. maybe more as time goes on, but i have this mindset that has been me all this life, and if it has something to say, it will reach that eventual climax, bubbling up from some unknown subconscious to change circumstances beyond what i can comprehend until they happen.

there is much more to this. i know that. i can put it into words but it is done a little at a time so that each piece has time to absorb.

that way, they proceed at a pace i dictate, in my very limited way. but at least i got the what i can get out of this life answered.

mediocre.

i was perusing through ben’s latest writings, and that word jumped up and smacked me in the face, and i’m still trying to sort it out. there’s such an aversion to mediocrity, and yet it just means average. noted that it does have slightly negative connotations, but i wonder if it is shunned because of the society we live in, or standards we’d like to think we hold for ourselves. could be something else, too.

i guess no one strives to be average though, and i guess that’s where the negative vibe comes from. it doesn’t take any effort to be mediocre, and yet you can still arrive there, no matter how hard you try. because that law of averages comes to bite you in the end, if you don’t have a little luck on your side.

but really, how can i escape mediocrity? i could just label my life as “non-mediocre” and that would pretty much be that. to other people’s standards though, i don’t think that would fly. so i have standards i hold myself to, and standards others hold up to me. i’m thinking that there is more of an influence from other people’s standards upon my own. it’s just easier to live up to other people’s expectations so they can’t bug you about not being up to code. it leaves me free to hold myself to my own standards, but mine aren’t always necessarily higher than other people’s. they aren’t necessarily lower, either.

depending on the time of day, those standards can be thrown a shovel to dig deeper down, or a ladder to bring them back up. it feels pretty variable to me, since they are my standards.

so here i wallow in my mediocrity, being average. which is totally subjective, except to my own standards. trying to get what i can while still maintaining a level to stay under the radar. is it so bad? is it a trap i set for myself? i feel like i’ve tried to claw my way out of this hole, and end up right here, where i started. me, with a garnish. i don’t know what to think about anything anymore, as circumstances can change a rock solid truth to a pile of sand, and it doesn’t even phase me anymore. not really.

the first question i ask when things change is “what can i do now that i know this?” i don’t question the idea behind the change, why it changed, how it changed, if i should be angry, or sad, or even if it could be changed back. i just think of how things are going to be effected by this change. and maybe that’s why i don’t go out looking to change things, because it would become this self-fueling pragmatism, that would probably swallow me whole.

it might be fun to do that for awhile, but it’s not who i am. i am very comfortable with who i am, but i couldn’t have arrived here through wisdom. maybe i did, but it wouldn’t consist of very much. i know that everything will change though, and my wisdom will be supplemented, and i will go on living. i’ll be flexible, and it could lead to greatness or tragedy, or both, i have no idea. my standards will continue to change with me, and i’ll just go from there.

there are fates far worse than mediocrity.

yikes! it’s busy up in here.

allrighty, i have to record tonight’s happenings.

i managed to get out of work a tad early today to go see the police through tickets heather had procured through her job. we got there like 10 minutes before they started, and they jumped onto stage with sense of purpose. i can’t believe how sting’s voice can hold out for 2 hours, and how well the band would mesh at times. it was such an awesome rock spectacle, with the light show, 10 foot diamond screens, stage antics, and a triple encore.

i was so pumped after the show that i came home, turned on guitar hero 2, and played “message in a bottle” 5 times in a row on expert, managing to get up to 99%. yes, i’ll admit, i pretended i was andy summers, the guitartist, rocking to a crowd of thousands next to sting.

it was totally awesome.

did i mess this up?