so much depends
upon
a yellow lady
bugbell

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
handlebars.



I've resolved to add a few miles in the middle of my workday to go pick up my daughter from pre-school. Why I never thought of this before is beyond me.

Thursday night my wife Christina learned that she had a ticket to go see none other than Sir Paul himself the next day. I jumped at the opportunity to get off work early and pick up Sierra. I had expected to work the next day but the need wasn't there, so I stayed at home.

Anyways, Friday afternoon, the hour hand was nearly on the 3 when I shut my Crash-O-Matic Computer® down and got all my rain gear on. Last time I had looked the rain was coming down in sheets. As it turns out, it wasn't any longer, but I knew that we'd be charged $1/minute if we were late, so I just left.

I was cranking it out, the yellow Burley close behind sucking up wind like a soggy, wet sponge on two wheels (meanwhile, I was denoting how much easier it was to deal with the wind on my fixed gear, but that's another story). I purposely rode though puddles just to try to cool off. At last, I arrived 5 minutes early.

Denoting a parking lot full of SUVs, I rested my bike up against a signpost and called Christina to check on her progress up I-5. Momentarily, Sierra came, queuing up with the other kids, separated from their parents only by the school doors. When at last these doors were opened, all noise was obscured by Sierra's incessant changing of "Daddy! Daddy! That's my daddy!"

I was beaming so widely, I was probably blinding the other parents.

Finally, just as the rain began again, they let her out and, man, was she pumped about getting picked up by bike! She kept telling me she loved me like I've never heard from her before.

I resolved to take it easy and enjoy our time together and probably looked like a prancing pony doing it.

I wasn't sure she'd really like the whole ride in the rain and traffic and I kept looking back to make sure she was alright. Everytime I did she told me she loved me.

She has been talking about it ever since.

..even today, when we actually went on a bike ride together. Mommy was tired, so we opted to let her have some peace and quiet. After breakfast, we suited up and headed off. We finally got Sierra the yellow bell she had been talking about now for days. We stopped for coffee and a muffin. Then got some chocolate treats for Christina at Sweet Life (if you've never been here, you must go.. their chocolate goodies are practically medicinal they're so good). Next we hung out at the library and read some books, played with other kids, had fun with puppets, laughed at a funny squirrel outside in the rain, went up and down the elevator and stairs, looked out the windows, oogled at art, and tried very, very hard to be quiet.

Finally, it became clear that it had been a long morning so we took off. There was another family getting their kid into a newer Burley for the soaking ride home when we left. There were a few blue herons watching us pass by on the way home, but Sierra didn't see them, lulled to sleep by the whirring of the freewheel and the quiet pitter patter of rain on clear vinyl.

After lunch and dinner divided by a nap, Christina and I realized that the pantry was bare and that we were hunrgy. So we opted for a pie at our favourite pizza place, Pizza Research Institute (another must see eatery in Eugene). We needed to get there in a hurry to be sure we got the pizza and got back in time for Sierra to go to bed and it was on the other end of town, so we drove the car.

But Sierra almost threw a fit when she discovered we weren't going on a bike ride. Especially when she saw the bell mounted up on her trike and realized how much easier it was to ding.

It's good to be a cyclist's daddy.