Last summer I went to Cres, an island in Croatia, with a few athletic friends. I knew we were going to "bike around an island" but I had this picture of biking around one of the islands by Charleston while sipping an iced tea, basically. Wrongo. About me: I do not bike. I sometimes would bike a mile to my office, but that's mostly it. And we have 40 miles planned on THIS island? Lolz for all.
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| Our bike path home looks innocent from here... |
So, did I turn into a super biker that day and conquer all with sheer willpower? No. I sweat my ass off, I embarrassed myself, I walked up tons of hills because I couldn't ride them. I had to get 1 person to break off with me and cover a mere 23 miles so that the others could go be hardcore. It was NOT how I saw that day going. Sometimes you just can't make your original plan stick. I guess it's a failure, technically.
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| Biking route! |
Aaaand? And it was AWESOME. It was secluded and beautiful. We rode down to a stone beach and swam in the Adriatic Sea. We took a hike/bike path back instead of the paved road, and that turned out to be super rocky and loose, so welcome to my first sort of mountain bike experience. I spent pretty much all day being intensely bad at what I was doing and it was still a fantastic experience in great company.
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| Colors of the Adriatic Sea |
You know, I bet there's a ton to be enjoyed and learned during most embarrassing failures. I feel like a lot of them could be fantastic despite themselves, if only I'd let them. I want to let go and be willing to see the vistas in my current bike ride. This whole PhD business.. man.. this was NOT how I saw my tenure here going. But my plans don't get more real just because I insist on them. And if I could stop worrying and start PEDALING (or you know, getting off and walking, because that had to happen a lot a lot), then I'd be going places. And eventually I'd arrive back home. And it would be a fantastic experience with so much learned and seen, so much more accomplished than I thought could be done given how outmatched I felt partway through. I hope I can learn to let go and trust God, because He'll pull me through this one way or another, I know, but I hate to miss all the amazing things I pass along the way!
