Life
is a river, that's what's granddad always used to say, a beginning an
end and million different ways in between, he used the metaphor his hole
life, following the path with least resistance, barrelling straight
through the impossible, clear as air and black as night. But how matter
what direction, or how it move, what it look like, the point according
to granddad was it the river always move forward. What push him running
like a rabbit until he was old and grey, the mystery what lays around
the bank.
This
days that mystery is hard to find the river is dirty, the sky cloudy,
for many of us life is a great adventure, all it's beauty, all it's
connections, funny thing is the river is never that far off, this is a
story of the way back in, to the rush of moving forward, born from the
earth, grown from the seeds of innovation, forged in the fire of
industry, the earth most efficient machine creates it's most efficient
animal, the bicycle, our novelty innovation.
Trails
like the season come and go build on a foundation, with diversity,
beauty, classic elegance, never quite repeating themselves, a morals made
of beginning's and ending's, with a million different ways in between
Granddad
was all about those connections, he had his hands in earth as much as
he did machines, maybe that's why he understood both sides. Sure we till
and cut, we reed and resolve, yeah we do great damage, but also capable
with great good. After all, no matter how smart we think we are, we are
just another part of the mystery, balance of bike ride, keep the pedals
turning, forget everything accept right now and there is no place you
cant ride, that's what granddad used to say.
I
once read that life is a act of suicide and its true, propably the only
"creature" on the planet will know this. Mabye that's why we are so
good at killing, it's going to die anyway. So we take some more but in
the proces we kill others less identities, things like flow, joy,
interaction, purpose, another way throught the world is lost, not by one
particular person but by instinct, survival, the very chaos of life
it's selve.
We
spent hours thinking, designing, questioning, also you can spent a few
seconds lost in one moment. No time to think, just reaction, focus, all
the worry washed away by the rush.When it comes to trails, when the
builder puts down the shovel and pick up the bike, when creation
overwrites destruction ...well...that's living.
I
still remember my first bike, a perfect little banana series with big
chopper handle bars and sparkling blue paint. Cruising down the sidewalk
feeling big even i was only seven. In a second the world grow
exponential, we found secret back alley, jumps they are whole four
blocks away, race to the corner store as fast as we could, candies
looking out of our pockets like stolen gold. With every ride, every new
adventure the chrome would fade, the rush will creep under the pain,
other kids will ride with newer bikes, my best friend Jimmy got a bmx he
can jump with that thing like nobody's business. Then we find a trail
and the world changed again. We find ourself deep in the forest, riding
over routes , dropping in the puddle, through the rain. My parents
promise me a bmx when i got a little bigger but for now the chopper will
have to do. One day far gone in the woods my perfect little banana
series broken too, the end of an age, i cried for a long time, even knew
a new bike wasn't far away, this thing become a part of me...it still
is. No matter how well we build tings, no matter how hard we love them,
by everything else, for whatever reason there are forces the aim to take
it all away.
It's
only taken 200 years to get here, 200 years of innovation and
invention, of not giving up. Complex by design, simple by nature, a
bike is nothing more than cycles turning cycles, it's the human motor
that makes it elegant. But no matter how far the bike is come, no matter
how much you can already do, the pushing doesn't stop, we still haven't
found the edge...
One
day the river meets the sea, and then it's not a river any more, it
past throug the wheels of change, in a way of experience, story's,
adventure. Then the ride stops, lost but not forever gone, for now as
far we can tell, the cycle of life...well...it never ends.!
/LifeCycles/
