Another Summit; Muschopauge Rd; Ali is Gone

Capping a three ride week  with a Sunday morning 45 mile mountain top summit loop that pushed me over the 100 mile mark for the fifth week in a row. These are the prime weeks of the cycling year. The light is long and the weather generally excellent.

Dubstoevsky in the cottony maw

Today, for example, was a beauty, though windy like a fucknatty. Serious northwest wind gust hurtling down from a revolving storm in eastern Canada. But warm. And mostly sunny. And luckily, on the climb to Wachusett's summit, the wind was wholly absent for half of the ascent, the mountain's bulk providing the windscreen.

Atop was a tumult of gust and blow, however, and I did not linger.

It's been a remarkable week, going back nine days to Friday June 3 when Muhammad Ali died on Allen Ginsberg's birthday (AG would have been 90). What other human being could unite so many disparate people by the common bond of the love of a single man? Or, how could one man mean so much to so many different people? Surely none other that Muhammad Ali.

And 40 years ago today I saw my first Grateful Dead show, at the Boston Music Hall, June 12, 1976 (listen here).

The raw persistence of time, and the unexpected gifts that appear along the way.

The Apex of Tuesday's Ride

Earlier in the week, on Tuesday, I rode north to Rutland and apex'd at Muschopauge Rd where I turned right and had the pleasure of (mostly) descending for three or four miles on hyper-rural, well-conditioned, traffic-free, roadways. Dreamscapes of curve and foliage tunnel, huge trees standing stout sentry in the thicket whirring past. Alive in the hurtling wind rush.