physical poverty

Flew into a Canadian airport. Hopped a ride. Drove through the city. Passed a sign counting down the days. 168 until the opening of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics. A Bob Roll written article titled "The Beautiful Therapy of Bike Racing" rests in my lap.

"When I was a young person, you could not reach me. You couldn't communicate with me, reason with me, drown me out with freezing rain or run me over with a train to keep me from riding. Everyday the miles I rode reduced me to ashes and dust but I was relentlessly reconstituted overnight by a seething, white-hot rage on slow boil...

"I began my riding career as a block of cement. I finished as a brand-new baby boy, all soft and gooey. I needed the miles, I needed the pain, I needed the ruin to become a more reasonable man."

168 more days of Bob Roll-esque chiseling. 168 more days to answer, "What will I do with my talent?" 168 days made up of specific moments where I'll be asked - if by nobody but myself - "What am I doing this moment to get better?" 168 days to come back back from adversity and shine, shine, shine.

I need the miles. I need a recommitment to cultivating a more robust mental outlook, where adversity is not a brake but an engine pushing me forward. I need to get to the point where I blush just reminiscing about the suffering and striving, the fitness building and the form-topping coming. I can do this. This better start... now. Time has a way of not putting itself in reverse.