When you can ride there.....
Riding the hardtail has its advantages. Actually, I'm really enjoying the autumn season riding this year, as there aren't many restrictions - aside from time. Cutting off on some dirt roads and just.....going to see, because I can. Amazing how liberating it is and allows my mind to just wander - and wander it does. These three-hour rides can really clear they mind - and burn a few calories, like an average of 2,000 every outing. Occasionally I just forget I have things to do back at home (or office) and just take my time, but the price to pay afterward is kind of a bummer. And to think we thought growing up and getting to a retirement age would be great. Be careful what you wish for.....
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| Back on the "Mule" - Mules ear before it snows again. |
Scots and Lass' 78 -81
Why it matters
Summer football had it's unique advantages of making new relationships well before school would begin. Such was the case that summer of '78. All of us...full of piss and vinegar as it were - or so we thought. By the time school started, we had a leg up on having a hand on our new and uncertain landscape - called high school. There was that one afternoon/evening following a sophomore home game early on, when we were hanging around with some of the other kids that weren't on the football team, but part of our class. It was amazing how we all just meshed together like a fine tuned machine - maybe even a Swiss-watch. Okay, maybe like an old hand-cranked ice cream machine, but we just seemed to belong in the same....thing. This was our crew that would endure the same type of thing for the next three years and somehow come out of it as adults ready to conquer and maybe even change the world. All that rubbish aside, I still remember that little gathering and what it would eventually come to mean. There may have been a dozen of us there, down by the old weight-room, by the east doors. It was all so new to us all, and we had our entire lives ahead of us - but what the hell could we possibly know? There we were and nobody really cared what side of the tracks you may have come from, or anything else for that matter. How you dressed, hair style, employment....we were all just kids looking for something to hold onto for the moment. Eventually we'd have the confidence and the audacity to let go and fly on our own. Sometimes that confidence would be encouraged by our peers, other times we'd be pushed into it by necessity. The funny thing about it, I don't remember any real peer pressure. Maybe some skepticism, but mostly healthy dialogue - mostly. And that became the mechanism that would propel us forward into the big world.
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| Last chance to do any bushwhacking before it snows.... |
When you realize what you had...
I've written about our gang - a lot, over the years. Our class was in that period between the hippies and the big-hair. I'd say by'78 the hippies were pretty much onto changing the world one mushroom, or joint at a time. By the time, we left the ranch, music had gone mostly "techno-pop" and the hairspray was out of control. Sure there were a few hold-on's, but not many. Maybe this can be attributed to the "MTV" generation, but that certainly wasn't us - at least I don't think so. The autumn of our senior year was without a doubt the period when we were getting our wings and looking to fly into the uncertain horizon. I can't say I knew where I'd be going into that particular football season. It wasn't until the week before our opener that I decided to challenge for a position. Prior to that, I was playing just about everywhere on the field. I don't recall thinking about making that challenge prior to that very moment, but when I did, I wasn't about to let that other guy have a chance. The first go around I beat him solidly. That kicked off a slug of other challenges involving other positions and players - none of which had happened prior to that day, nor would they happen for the remainder of that season. After a few other guys unsuccessfully challenging positions, the kid I had already beaten wanted a second chance, but the coaches were having none of it. They said he'd have to wait until the next practice, but I wanted it settled once and for all - "so lets go!". And go at it we did. I'll have to give him some credit as he came off harder the second time than the first with the coaches having to call it early to restart, as we both had lost our footing over the prescribed area - call it a draw - maybe. More determined, I was set on making this convincing and told them we're settling it now, regardless of me owning that spot at the moment. That third and last round was overly convincing. Let just say there wasn't going to be any doubt -and there never was. But now I was the guy at that spot and had to carry my weight, doing my part without excuse. Always knowing what my weakness would be against other players, I had to learn to use my strengths as an advantage - if I had any any strength to use. The one strength I know I always had was not only my teammates, but our loyal classmates. I've written about the time we played a rare Saturday game. Tammy and her crew were atop the summit at Sardine Canyon, on the side of the highway when our team bus flew by on the way to Logan. They made us feel like Vikings off to pillage the empire of unknown lands. Not long after that (maybe a couple weeks), we had some unofficial activity down at this little dumpy burger joint by the O-river. I remember it being dark and cold - maybe raining outside. I think it was Iron Horse week. Another of several games we should have clearly won that year - but that's another story for another day. I don't remember any underclassmen there, just our class. I'm sure they were there, but they didn't blend into our fabric - our Tartan Plaid as it were. I could list off the names, but could never adequately describe the almost magic atmosphere. What was clear - we were about to disembark and go on to something/somewhere else in our lives. We all knew the innocence had been spent and it was time to go - wherever "go" was to be. It wouldn't be for many years, like decades, before I would put that evening into context and understand what we had and where it was all going.
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| The last of the glass and sunny images for a while...... |
The tribute
It is said a soldier can never return to his home, or his country. I've come to understand that it isn't the place which has changed as much as it is the soldier. After you have experienced the death and destruction that is war, you never see things the same again. That is the same with life and going home. We all long for the comfort of what we may have known to be our safety and comfort of our youth - for those that were fortunate to have such a thing. Others were never that lucky, but we sure the hell were - at least I was. To that end, I pay tribute to my brothers and sisters that shaped my life in those special and important years. Sure, I may have been the only one to have been thrown out into a mudpuddle, stark-ass naked in front of what seemed to be the entire student body, but it all made me somehow a better person anyway. We all had our short comings and our insecurities, but we were still a part of something bigger than any one of us alone. The fabric of that particular Tartan Plaid is that which we all wear somehow -whether we know it or not. I know there are a few that will have nothing to do with any of "it" anymore, but I guess that is understandable as well. I mean, we were kind of unremarkable, but so remarkable at the same time. Stop to look at it for what it was, and what it really is anyway.
So.....why is it that I've come to this point? A couple weeks ago I got out the old year books to see what if anything Reed may have written back in the day. You know, the meaningless stuff we mostly have forgotten - mostly. Our sophomore year I had something written in my yearbook I never have forgotten. This particular girl who was a remarkable athlete and a totally awesome person (in my humble opinion), wrote what sunk in hard; "You are the laziest, but funniest person I know...". I have never forgotten that insignificant post. I also will never forget what I wrote in a friends yearbook our senior year, knowing the girl I was "smitten by" would read it, as I knew she would have access to his yearbook at some point. It was rank and disgusting comment if only to make an impression - that to this very day I don't know why I'd do such a thing, other than it was truly the path I was on for some reason. Whether the words we read or write, they have meaning and gravity. I can never go back and I don't think I want to. Mile Post 44 carries a lot of meaning, but going home isn't always what we think it will be when we actually get there. Maybe there is no going home.....
Remembering '66
One of my older sisters graduated fifteen years before us - from the truly MIGHTY BL. That class lost five of their clan to the bullshit we know as Vietnam. No other class from our school has ever had anything even close. Put it in perspective. She made it a point to find all five of them on the "WALL" when she visited DC many years ago - because they are of her particular Tartan Plaid. That was back in the day when the old "BL" was on the mountain at the top of Douglas Street - not over where it is now , where the "W" used to be. There was pride in being a Scot/Lass. Make no mistake, pride in your Tartan Plaid is real.
Here's to those of my Tartan Plaid
Like it or not, we are all woven into our own fabric of Tartan Plaid. Wear it with a sense of pride. Nobody else can say the same. Remember those who are no longer with us and those that shook us all - somehow. Pass it along. The world needs us now...
Pulling for Reed! Ride because you can....Make it hurt!
