One to Go

"One to go!" One to go? One to go? Only half way up Burbank Canyon, but my mind was already feeling the effects, and I struggled to find some kind of response, anything even half way witty would have been a success. Instead the only thing that came out was a sort of snort; it was meant to be a laughing snort but, in retrospect, probably sounded like derision. I had come upon the four women as they walked up canyon, passing them on the fly, expecting a nod or wave, but in no way imagining the likelihood that talking would be involved. Damn.

The rest of the climb was spent in contemplation - what did she mean, one to go? Was it one mile, one lap? Was there another rider behind me and she was calling out that fact to her companions? Mostly though, I thought about what kind of retort I might have made, what I might say if I should happen to pass them again; I never did think of anything.

Soon enough the grade eased up, then changed direction for the run down to Johnson's Pasture. I stopped at the top of the Sugar Cutoff, savoring the hillside view just long enough for another rider to pass along the road at the bottom of the hill, the cutoff's lower end. His passage was silent at first, the delay between speed of light and speed of sound, before the familiar motor-less glide over firmly packed granite reached my ears.

Changing directions, and heading east along the Palmer-Evey, I jumped to my feet at Little Palmer Canyon to check out the little trickle of water that flows there year around. I tried to discern the trace of a trail that used to go up canyon along the stream there, but any sign that there ever was such a thing seems to have been obliterated over the years since I last followed that path. It was only two-thirty, but already the sun had slid along the sky far enough that the near ridge was casting the cleft into deep shadow, all but the tops of the trees settling in for a night still hours away. I stopped crunching through the thickness of fallen oak, sycamore and alder leaves for a moment to listen to the sound of trickling water. That was when I heard the shadows, the hidden spaces upstream, up canyon. They were alive with crickets making crickety sounds until broken by rushing wings departing the tree tops, a trio of doves startled to flight by some thing deeper in or, perhaps, higher in the sky, where two hawks sailed the currents.

It's the weekend, time to follow that never-ending road and see where it leads. Have a good ride.