Youthful Enthusiasm

January 16, 2022

Youthful Enthusiasm

What was that little dude, like five years old, maybe? At the most. He made me think there must be no feeling quite like being five and on your bike. Up the point where our paths crossed I had been playing tortoise to a couple graveleer hares, they keeping to the wider roads up the wash, me favoring the single track section between those roads. And so, at the end of the dam, when they turned up the paved road to the top, it made my choice of route to the top easy - the switchback trail.

And that is where, about half way up vertically, I crossed paths with the little feller and his mom. Trail etiquette says I had the right of way, but he was having so much fun that it would have been a shame to not let him continue. (Besides, it was a good excuse to catch my breath, after all that tortoise-hare stuff.) So I pulled over, and he started back down on his little strider-type bike. He also must have given the "throttle" a little twist just to show that his bike was a special bike. A sound box somewhere on it produced a little motor sound, and I said alriiiiight!. And he said Yeeeaaaah! as he went on past, at least until his mom called out to him to use your brakes, slow down.

Sometimes those little moments make the day (or at least provide inspiration for the next blog post), and I was feeling youthfully renewed; enough to get back to pedaling. There were hills to finish climbing and, as it would turn out, three more times would I cross paths with the two hares.

There might be a great difference in age and miles ridden between that little dude and myself, but one thing is the same for us both - that youthful enthusiasm we experience while riding our bikes. It never leaves you.