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Which feeling, you ask? The one you had yesterday, or the last time you rode your bike to work, of course. You know, that invigorated, why the hell haven’t I been doing this everyday because I feel so awesome right now feeling. Hold on to that one. And get on your bike and leave the car keys at home.

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I don’t usually get behind “days,” but this one seems worth it.

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Posted via web from practicalpedal’s posterous

 A Fabrication

by Wiley Davis

He began to speak as if he knew what was on my mind.

"In my land we have no water and so we must manufacture it. In other lands, lands that I have been to, they have artesian wells and springs that deliver water unasked from the mountains and the soil. The people in those lands speak of the great joy in filling an earthen pot with this water and letting it engorge their mouths. They do this and then forget about its pleasantness. Do you know a people such as this?"

"Yes," I said. "Yes I do."

His eyes snapped up at mine and then fell back down into a gaze aimed at his unseen feet, which were silent in the puddle of shadow soaking the floor of the cabin. I sat down by the fire and pulled off my boots, slowly, carefully trying to keep the skin on the backs of my heels from coming off with them. My skis were outside. I put the wool socks and the boots in front of the fire and entertained a prick of concern over their smell. I dropped the notion; we weren't among women.

I had been expecting to find Gordon at the cabin. There were tracks leading in and smoke from the cabin's chimney was visible from a good distance. We had skied this trail four years in a row and had never found the cabin occupied. I spent the last half hour of the trail considering this possibility.

He had probably decided to let his intern finish the proposal after all. It would be like him to drive out here a few hours ahead of me and push hard to the cabin. Gordon liked to surprise people. It was no stretch of the imagination to picture him sitting in front of the stone fireplace, trying to hide his shortness of breath, acting as if he'd been there for hours waiting for my arrival. My hopes were up, not too different from the way both of us would imagine finding women at the cabin in years past.

But only the old man was present. He looked down at his feet, his hands were on his knees. His skin was tattooed with black lines of shadow that paralleled the curvature of his wrinkles, which were visible in the firelight only as oak-colored ridges. I had the impression that he would not exist without them.

I emptied the contents of my backpack onto the floor of the cabin in a rough manner meant to disguise my uneasiness. I paid attention to my gear. There is something about men who stare at their feet that makes communication uncomfortable.

"How was the snow on your way up?" he asked. I wondered if he hadn't seen it for himself or if he was just making conversation. After his initial greeting, however, I appreciated the straightforward question.

"Icy… and windy… too windy."

"Not a very good day for you then," he said, in such a way as to make absolutely no comparison between his day and mine. It wasn't a good day for me but I felt that it should have been. There is a list of requirements for good days but I don't know where that list is. The old man dropped the small talk, "These people with the wells, when I watched them drink from clay pots on a day with a killing heat, I saw abandon. They get such a great pleasure from this tasteless, odorless, dead thing. And then they leave it at the well with forgetfulness. My people, in my land, have to manufacture our water and so it is a different thing."

The roof of the cabin strained against the walls to take flight in the wind outside. The walls were winning but the wind, I knew, was turning the snow into ice. The morning run would be difficult.

"Much of our time goes into this manufacture. It is not something that we like to do but it is something that we must do in order to survive. My people do not know the unattached joy of drinking from clay pots on hot days directly. This we also must manufacture."

I wasn't sure what he was talking about but he didn't appear to be expecting me to. I unrolled my sleeping bag on the cot in the corner and stripped down to my thermal underwear. My muscles hurt. I can't say that they ached because aching suggests a romantic component. My muscles were in no mood to be martyrs for experience.

"The dark side to knowing how something works is seeing how trivial it is. Triviality does not support the illusions of those who see the truth. In my land, people boast of their anticipation for the water as they spread out the giant plastic sheets in the sun. There is nothing romantic about the stinging sweat that drips into their eyes and stings like nettles do. Some fall cold to the ground in the heat, without sweat to sting their eyes. These people want to die. Replacements come to fill the vacated places on the sheets. They talk of their fallen compatriot's devotion to the manufacture of water, a devotion which the replacements do not feel themselves. The fallen want to die and care nothing for the water which is a tasteless, odorless, and dead thing.

"Some people in some lands have wells and springs. For them water is a thing that can be appreciated directly. They neither dream about it nor remember it. Because of this, they are more truthful with water than we will ever be. For us, water is a fabrication."

I was very tired but the man continued to talk. His feet, along with all things in the cabin that touched the ground, were lost in the puddle of shadow which grew as the fire dimmed. The room was bottomless and things floated. I wished the man would be quiet and let me sleep. If I wasn't so tired I would have been interested, but tonight was not the ideal time.

"When the reservoirs are again filled at the end of the week the men can think of nothing but the water and how it will quench them. When the time for drinking comes even the fallen ones who have recovered come out to drink. They talk about their devotion to the manufacture of water and their willingness to fall again if necessary."

The old man seemed intent on finishing his story. I listened like you listen to crazy people on the bus. I thought about how I would describe this old man to Gordon.

"The cups get passed around and every man takes for himself a portion of water that he drinks. The potential contained in that liquid tumbling toward your throat is like this snow that you have that comes falling to the ground in so many ways that a person could spend a lifetime counting them. It is the memory of all the things you believe you have done. Then it canvasses your tongue and you know that it is a tasteless, odorless, and dead thing and nothing more. You see that the others have finished their water and you let out what you hope is a sigh of completion, satisfaction because you don't want your naked truth to ruin the beautiful construction of the water for the others. It is your secret and you keep it well.

"Two days later, the task of making water must be renewed. On this day, the men wake in the morning and are tired and would like to remain in their beds. The water is a beautiful memory and a glorious hope. They wake because of it. This tasteless, odorless, and dead thing is their life."

I looked at the man and was surprised to see his eyes staring at me. For the first time that evening he looked like he expected me to say something. "Interesting," was the best I could come up with.

"Soon, in retrospect, you will understand what I have told you. But then it will be too late. Go to sleep." He took his own advice and curled up on his side. The puddle of shadow had crept up the walls and I saw nothing.

#

When I woke up, the man was still there, even though I expected him not to be. He was asleep on his side and he wore a pair of wool socks on his feet which poked out from underneath his blankets. I dressed quietly and stepped outside into the snow. I noticed the old man’s skis leaning against the cabin. They were a newer model than mine. I put on my skis and began kicking across the meadow toward the east trail. I listened to the soft scraping of my skis and felt my muscles ache. I thought about the remarkable people you meet in the wilderness and began crafting my memory. The snow was still lousy.

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via flickr.com

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Posted via email from practicalpedal’s posterous

Posted via web from Wiley Davis

Seconds after crossing the finish line for the SCORE San Felipe 250 off-road race. Glad to be off the quad after an 8-hour ride dodging trophy trucks and rocks.

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