"Ba-a-a-a-a-a-a!"

So there I was 2 days ago, gassed, starving for air, feeling much like a fish out of water, or, at least what I imagine a fish out of water would feel like, looking up the road, feeling my age. The day had finally come. I've known that someday it would happen, just not so soon...well, at least it seems soon. Yet, at the same time, as strange as it may be, on more of a paternal level, it couldn't get here fast enough.


Since AJ was big enough to ride a bike, he's been following me. He's followed me all over this beautiful state. Up and down the coast, all over the Sierras, everywhere bikes are allowed, and some places they aren't. He'd ride his little 20' Trek down the Bear Valley Trail out at Point Reyes while I ran. He'd pedal as hard as he could, leaving me running behind. He'd look back at me with a smile that would brighten even the darkest places in my often troubled heart. I'd see the look in his eye, and watch, as the seed of competition started taking root. He was taking his first sip of that ever so sweet nectar. A sweetness unparallelled by any other, a sweetness that only a son would know.
I'd take him up to Auburn where we'd ride the upper side of the Forresthill Divide trail. Every time we'd go, we'd go just a little bit further. Sometimes I'd ride up ahead and out of sight, jump off, and crouch behind the brush, or a rock or tree and watch to see what his reaction would be. Sometimes he'd get frustrated and slow down. I'd see his little eyes well up and hear his little chest ripping open gasping for air, trying to breathe, trying to keep up with Dad. Other times, he'd grit his little teeth and I'd hear him grunting up the hill. I'd holler at him to keep going, and "suck it up." I sometimes would say mean things, things that shouldn't be said to a little boy. I thought I was motivating him, thought it would make him stronger. But, most of the time, he was having to pay for my shortcomings in life. I'd take my frustrations out on him. I whip myself with those memories.
I was just barely a young man when AJ was born. At 22 years old what the hell did I know about anything? I had been heading in several different directions simultaneously. He was 6 months old before I held him in my arms. Once I did, you'd have to shoot me dead to keep me away from him. He was my son. And that was that. He quickly became my reason for getting up everyday and doing it all over again. I considered myself lucky in fact. While most other guys my age were searching for their own reason, all I had to do is walk a few feet down the hall every morning, look into the next room and there was mine, sound asleep. Off to work I'd go.
Most of the time I'd help him. I'd ride up a steep section of the trail, dismount, and run back down to the bottom and push him up the hill. Running beside him, I'd ask him, "Are you a little mouse, or are you a mt. goat!?!" He'd let out a "Ba-a-a-a-a" imitating a little mt. goat and with the heart of a lion, he'd work his little legs until they couldn't go anymore. We'd take breaks on logs, or rocks that would overlook a meadow or a running stream and eat our lunch before heading back. It was Pizza or In-n-out Burger that was on both our minds by the end of the ride. It's those times that I love and cherish. But it's the times when life would get the best of me, when my patience was at it's end that I'm tortured, and tormented by and it's those same memories that come to me now as I watch him ride up the road leaving his Dad behind. At first I'd get frustrated, like before, only, different now. I'd get upset because I'd feel as if he had no respect for me, conveniently forgetting that every ride that we'd been on, from the time he was just a little boy, to now, he'd been eating his Old Man's dust and taking all my crap on the chin. He's been waiting for this for a long damned time.
Just yesterday, while climbing the first roller through the feed zone on Cantelow, I looked at him and said, "Go!" "What, what do you mean?" he replied. "Go, don't let me hold you back." He proceeded to drop me so fast that I thought he must have ridden off the road. For a second, I was looking down the side of the hill as I crested the first roller after the feed zone because there was no way he could drop me THAT fast. Just as I round the corner, I look up the road and there he is, out of the saddle, hammering up the next roller and not looking back. Drinking in that sweet nectar that only a son would know. That sweet nectar that comes with finally besting your Dad, and knowing that it'll never be the same. He's been sipping that nectar for quite a few months, but now, he gulps it down, hardly taking a breath. Dad can no longer push him, in fact, the tables have completely turned, I wait for the day that he looks back and says, "Come on Dad, suck it up!" "Are you a little mouse, or a F***ING mt. goat...BEEOTCH!
Until that day, I practice my mt. goat impression...in silence...of course.