Ride Before Protest: The Good Red Road
Saturday morning, before heading out to protest the multitude of signs directing this country down the wrong path, there was plenty of time to grind out a couple laps Out There, keeping primarily, though not entirely to the roads. It got me to wondering how many people who ride Out There today can recall a time when all we had were those dirt roads, before the trail gnomes got busy with their shovels and pick axes, their pruners and their saws. All that work of theirs opened up a lot of that hidden, quiet middle ground that, when i wanted to explore, required me to stop pedaling, drop my bike and go out on foot. When you think about it everything around us is a small piece of an immense story. Those "new" trails, some of which probably make their lines along deer tracks, curve around and through a landscape like a tongue that helps to vocalize the vowels and consonants that make up the words of a story. They criss-cross old watercourses, descend and climb out of basins whos...
