God HAS given us an assignment, Survive with Honor. Love one another. Create
something meaningful. I don’t think
she’s playing, she’s watching... I don’t
like the salvation requirement(believe Jesus Christ is the only divine human)
but I do wonder if that or a similar belief is practically necessary to keep
people from caring too much about this life.
If everybody got really committed to the game here on earth, the rules
could get laxer and the play, meaner.
Nasty, brutish, and short would be more than a philosophic tagline.
My sister Katherine in Larkspur had a
beautiful warm up ride around Tiburon and Belvedere to Paradise City and back
planned for this AM. My biking brother
in law Tom had to work, which was good, because they need to get this little
corner of paradise paid for before California falls apart(financially and or
geologically). He’s also a beast and
since I would be hammering for the next 13 days I was looking forward to the
touring mode in perfect conditions. So
we got all ready to ride 30-40 miles around Marin County, I gave Hardy the
Gitane and Daniel the Six-thirteen while I took the T1 and the pack for all the
extras. We got all ready to go and
Daniel couldn’t clip in. He had never
ridden a bike with clip-ins! Daniel is a
cross country runner, spare of frame and aerobically fit but he had last ridden
a bike when he was 8 or 12. Big problem
with a lot of traffic on Marin County roads.
He also had never used shifters, either downtube or brake lever. The concept of shifting was also a little
weak. Now he is a college student and
can learn quickly but Christ! we were about to ride across half the country on
highways. I didn’t promise his daddy
that I would bring him back alive but I felt a certain responsibility as the
+21 yo. I asked Hardy to give him a
bike lesson around the neighborhood, and then branch out to some busy
streets. Tomorrow we were riding across
the Golden Gate and through San Francisco and I thought a bit of biking finesse
was warranted before getting plastered by a bus.
My sister took me to the Verizon store to get my cell phone
charger. We then did a stunning loop
down to Corte Madera and out around Belvedere to Tiburon where there are
obviously a lot of people who are NOT financially challenged and have it made
except when the fog messes up their views.
Not today. Cool, low humidity,
plenty of water all around and all I could think of was how yesterday I was
looking at my steaming car on the side of the road in the middle of Death
Valley. Life’s changeable.
We spent a little time testing out the
bikes and trying to ensure we had all we needed to leave the next day. I had planned to use my usual two water
bottles with hand-offs periodically from the Sag Wagon but I got scared and
bought a Camelback. The thought of Death
Valley, a broken down car, and 1 water bottle made me nervous. I have subsequently wondered what it would
have taken for the three of us to ride our bikes out of Death Valley and
whether pushing on or going back would have been more prudent. We were some 10 miles from Furnace Creek or
only 10-12 miles into the Park. It was
at least 30 miles back to Beatty, Nevada and it didn’t look like much. Forward to Lone Pine was at least 90
miles. I’m a forward going kind of
person and my recollections of Lone Pine at the base of Mt. Whitney were more
verdant. So if I couldn’t get the car
started and needed a 90 mile tow, what would we have done? We had plenty of water in the car but how
much water would we need to carry to ride 90+miles in 121 degree heat? I am glad I did not have to solve that
problem.....
Another problem is where to find honor and
nobility in a world that values cleverness more than virtue? Too many successful people are too clever by
half. To succeed means to one up. To pursue virtue when many others are having
a good time or trying to fool you is to be haughty or naive. Gaming the system
or relying on the letter of the law tends to undercut the social
consensus. Image, despite Agassi’s
claim, is not everything. If everything
is about winning, then the group with the lousy hand could (should?)play a
different game with a higher probability of winning. Call it-- Kill the parasites.
There is obviously a Real World, we create an Apparent World
superimposed on it, and the Virtual World has recently become home for many of
us. I am after all on my computer to
send you this missive. If everybody is
busy constructing their own virtual world to live in, how important is the
social world we all inhabit as citizens? Where is the Energy in the social
world? Do we really think of ourselves
as citizens with responsibilities
anymore? Who goes to City Council
meetings or belongs to a political party?
I believe the phrase is “bowling alone”.
The internet and technology have sucked the life out of historical
institutions and delivered greater POTENTIAL but like the TV, the promise is
not equal to the reality it creates.
Morphing from a word based to an image based world has changed the kind
of society we are. We tweet (tweak?) in
separate rooms not talk and build on the social commons. In fact I don’t know where that is.....
TEN VIRTUES or why do we keep talking about the ten
commandments?
1. Love 6. Justice (Nobility)
2. Honesty 7. Temperance (Balance)
3. Courage 8. Spontaneity
(Openness)
4. Generosity 9. Passion or Ardor (Desire)
5. Hardworking
(Persistence) 10. Gratitude
We cannot be Good without God but we can be all of the above
things w/o God. If we were all of the
above things—if we had all those virtues—how close to “good” would we be? I would argue very, very close. I think the faithful and the secular can
agree that the above qualities (virtues) are desirable and would hope to find
them in everyone. We would not agree
about the Nature of Reality but we could agree the above 10 virtues belong in
the heart of every human being.
We bought some more tubes and a handlebar
bell. A ludicrous purchase for the ride
across Nevada. We could see 40 miles
from the top of Carroll Summit and not one car anywhere! We rode 64 miles without seeing a car. Not one car passed us either direction for 4
hours of riding. We didn’t need the
bell.
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