Wind, Rain, Fun

This post is for all of you who told me you thought I couldn't handle the Michigan weather.

Wednesday night is group mountain bike night. You probably already know this since I usually only post on Thursday now. (Really, I do have a life other than Wednesday night riding. I just keep forgetting to write about it.) This week Wednesday arrived with something like 60 mph winds and rain. I took my riding stuff to work, but really I thought everyone else would bail and I'd get out of riding in the wind, rain and dark.

No one else bailed.

I have met my match in crazy with this group. When no one else bails there's really no choice but to ride  because if you don't you'll look like a wimp.

I hate looking like a wimp.

So- my trusty partner Cheryl and I headed out in our usual fashion, which is basically me just following blindly because I never know where I'm going.  Until last night, I also followed blindly because since I don't really know what I'm doing on a mountain bike I just try to follow her line and figure if she can ride over it so can I.

Just so you know- that theory was ridiculous. Within 2 minutes she rode over a log, which I then proceeded to hit and skid sideways along. Two seconds later I was on my ass.

Thankfully the boys hadn't caught up to us yet so no one got to witness this display of complete and utter ungracefulness. (Spellcheck doesn't think that's a word, but if spellcheck knew me, it would know this word. I'm pretty ungraceful most of the time.)

In fact, I'll just go ahead and admit that I'm pretty sure I managed to be completely ungraceful for over and hour while we rode, which leads me to a new reason to just keep riding behind my trusty partner. She doesn't have to witness how completely awkward I can manage to be on a mountain bike.

That said- I also want to clarify that while I might be ungraceful, I'm incredibly grateful at the same time. Grateful for new friends that will ride in the rain and wind, grateful for a riding partner who always finds the trail (and doesn't laugh when I talk to myself while riding) and grateful for this crazy weather that lets me feel like I'm a badass just for being out there.

Cuz we all know I'm never that much of a badass so I need the weather to help me out on this one.