A long time ago, it began, I looked into the mirror and with a frown, realized there was more to me; an unseen expanse waiting unseen, where the me ends and the I expands like a wondrous landscape into infinite.
The memory of my first road trip paid me a visit today…
Day Zero, 4 am
The darkness lazily hung down from the sky, cold and wet as the morning dew; deep blue of a long night giving way to dawn. We stood outside, packed under leather jackets, on each side of the Enfield; fog curled in our warmth escaped our excited breath, unnoticed, hearts beating just a little faster.
Silent, the night was dreaming its last dream before it wakes up. We quietly pulled the gloves off our hands, laid the helmets on the seat and prepped our bike tying rucksacks to either sides. A middle aged man passed us by, jogging quietly, letting his eyes rest on us a little longer, turning his head back as he crossed us.
She was ready, glorious rusty red in this violet dawn. We put our helmets on, and then slid the gloves back on, securing them at the wrists. He took the handle and quietly placed himself on the bike, pulling her weight up straight. I stood on the side, breathing out plumes of condensation in the helmet, warm suddenly. Everything was somehow even more still, as my breathing quieted and the padding of the helmet snugly covered my ears. He kicked the bike alive and she roared, waking up the sleeping world; and everything soared, inside outside, omnipresent.
He gave the accelerator a few turns, warming her up, and somehow, the warmth spread out from somewhere inside me also and I smiled not knowing that I was. I sat behind him and adjusted a little, straightening my back, shifting the weight of the rucksack on my back to the rim behind.
And then I looked ahead, only dark, the fog denied me any awareness of what’s to come, like time. I had waited for this for years, it was here; that beginning. All my years of discipline, listening to the world, doing well for the smiles of others, being right, being sane, successful, being tied; I felt like the bird that’s born in a cage not knowing what it is; suddenly now, coming to its own awareness. That puzzling dream in the night, of flight, wasn’t a dream, was essence.
And I had managed to grab that last dream before I wake up by its edges, moments before it would have vanished, and drag it with me to the waking reality, a vivid truth
The roar of the bike held in it the impatient rumbling of the wait, and the thunder of a breaking out. I am here now, begun; I said to the me I knew.
The gear paddle clicked to the first under his feet, one last time she roared again before he let go of the clutch. My blood rushed as the adrenaline kicked in, soaring I sat, ready to take my first flight, watching her rumbling with might, tearing the night into two; the cold slapping us hard yet failing to discourage. Her powerful rumble under us was all we could hear, a million drums, resonating life.
And cutting through heavy haze, under the still sleeping violet night, blind, the three of us had begun.
This blog was originally published on 'Just About Everything'