Mt. Tam Calling

Oh, Amy?  Here...........  It's for you...............  Oh, it's no big deal.  It's just Mt. Tam.

Climbing Mt. Tam was a lofty/unrealistic goal Billy and I set for ourselves back in 2012 when we first started riding bikes more seriously together.  That year we ventured to do a few slightly less leisurely rides like climbing up to Skyline and riding the American River Trail from Sacramento to Fair Oaks to visit my parents.

We have hyped Mt. Tam FOR-EH-VOR.  We watched youtube videos.  Discussed getting our brakes changed.  Went back and forth about tentative dates.  And thoroughly psyched ourselves out completely about this 12 mile climb until finally Billy got it out of his system the day after Thanksgiving 2013.  I remember him skype-recapping this experience with mixed emotions (smiling and swearing and smiling again...).

Since returning from France I've invested even more time in the saddle alongside Billy and dreamed of making the Mt. Tam trek...  to the point where it seemed like every time I crossed over the Park Street bridge I heard Mt. Tam whispering my name in the wind... "Amy!  Amy!  Come ride me!"  Ha!  Maybe I built it up a little too much???  Well you can imagine my surprise when an impromtu Saturday morning ride with a friend who races for Dolce Vita turned into a group ride up to the *tippy* top of Mt. f#$^*ing Tam!  OMG

So.......  I get off BART at 16th & Mission Street to meet my new *fast* female friend who I had been emailing with all week about doing a long-ish endurance ride (3 hours/50 miles-ish, but I was thinking easy, maybe Tiburon loop or something like that).  Uhhhh.... First thing she says to me is "Did you get my email?!"  I was like "I'm sorry I didn't" thinking to myself "Well, *that's* because you were in bed like a granny at 8pm last night," so.....  She was like, "Well, Mei - [Ding!  Bright orange synapses fired full-speed strava signals to my pleasure center like I'm about to meet a celebrity...  ALL HAIL!  Mei, queen of San Francisco segments!] - invited us to join her on the Bespoke ride, but they are taking off from Pac Heights in fifteen minutes."  Well, ignoring every alert my body was sending to go ahead and abort this mission I jumped on her wheel and we jammed up the wiggle to meet the group.

When I squeaked up on my ten-year-old death-metal-bumper-stickered Specialized tank to 20 geared-out astronauts in their fancy pants kits straddling some of the nicest bikes I've ever seen I looked like such a newb and - I tell ya - the oops-I-pooped-my-pants smell coming from my worn out spandex didn't help much.  About ten seconds after we arrived, Justin, the apparent leader of the pack started to explain the route.  He never actually said "Mt. Tam".  Oh no.  While he dropped names like "Pantoll" and "East Hills" and "wait - did he just say Alpe d'Huez - what?!?"  I focused most of my attention on keeping my breakfast down...

We took off and, oh you know, just that feeling when you are all the sudden on a group ride and you have to quietly ask your friend if he was talking about GOING UP TO THE TOP OF MT. TAM!?!?!

LOL





Once we started climbing we didn't stop.  The road just kept going up.  For an hour.  Between expletives I managed to cough questions at cyclists passing me by about how much further it was to Pantoll.  They just laughed or told me to not worry about it or pedaled faster to clear the stench.  I couldn't even believe it when I arrived at the top, though - I gotto say - can't beat the view!

While the rest of the group rode down to Stinson Beach and back, I climbed at a conversation pace the rest of the way from Pantoll with a few other ladies who agreed that tacking another .5 miles of vertical climbing was insane (but not Mei - no way!).  Haha!  The three of us split up about half way down the hill and my new friend (who turns out is the sweetest woman in the world - and she speaks French!) picked up lunch and a coffee together in SF.  I didn't get home until after 4pm!  What a beautiful ride though.  Oh man.  Though I was overwhelmed and beat, I actually don't think I've ever felt better.

Poetry is Bravery

Last week I picked up a mini magazine called PROG! at my local newsstand/coffee shop/bar.  The postcard-sized booklet advertises 24 pages worth of cool cultural happenings in and around Tours.  Lo and behold!  The first Monday of every month, a café in Tours Centre hosts a free *keyword* poetry reading.  So, before my usual Monday night sauna and swimming sesh, I built up some courage and jumped on the tram to find some poets, poems, and poetry.  Oh la la! 

Opening the thick door to the café, I realized that the average age was 62 (this number was significantly lowered by one young suicidal-looking gentleman).  Central themes were nature, family, love and tenderness.  Under normal circumstances, this poetry might induce vomiting.  However, since I was too distracted by the meanings of the words (pronounced loudly and clearly), the poetry reading became more like an extraordinary listening exercise.  We went around the room and everyone read something…  Luckily, before I left the house, I jotted down a few of my favorite poems from Birds of Arizona, by William Moor (just in case - anticipating that I might need some material myself).  Here is what I read:

Greater White-fronted Goose

And

june

Mallard

I

Cinnamon Teal

Mandela and when you are going

Ruddy Duck

A house plan

Wild Turkey

If

all

of the

huge

cost

all of

us

all

just

Montezuma Quail

Are

they are and are in

R a

R

R and

who are in the

R

R

R

R

Neotropic Cormorant

The

Cedar Warwing

That

, that

man

that the

Yelllow Warbler

Click the

...  Cool right?!  Haha!  I stayed for a while afterwards to talk to the president of their association (who happens to live right down the street from me in Saint Cyr) and another very nice woman who pretty much told me her life story.  Their poetry was not at all what I’m used to.  Poetry where I come from challenges great big ideas with interesting sounding words that cut into your thoughts and graft them with your feelings.  Truly, this experience left me with a deep sense of gratitude for Billy and his poetry and the poetry community in the Bay Area.

I've realized that, no matter what topic you choose to write about or what country you inhabit, writing poetry is an incredibly brave act.  So I wrote a poem.   I’m sure the poem I'm about to share with you has been written before – either by a sad solitary peace corps worker, or a lonely soldier in some dugout somewhere craving the greatest creation to ever come from the United States besides the internet…  I'm warning you - it's so bad that it's even more bad, but here it is anyway:

Peanut Butter Poem

On a sunny afternoon

I will lick you from a spoon

Chunky, smooth, sweet

You’re all I ever want to eat

You make me more me

Pee

Bee

This week I've been working on a few poems inspired by different circumstances I've encountered while living here in Saint Cyr.  I'm also working overtime on my French...  Billy sent me a link to this site, which is a fun way to learn a new language:  www.duolingo.com  Check it out!

That's all for now.  More later!

Joints

So, there's no word for knuckle in French.  It's just called a finger joint.  You can probably imagine the conversation where I found this out, but here it is anyways:

Me:  "Hey cool wow!  What's your skin doing on your fingers?"
Nono:  "It's paint."
Me:  "Haha, not that.  I'm talking about the weird peeling thing on your - wait - what do you call that?"
Nono:  "What?"
Me:  "How do you say that in French?"  [points at knuckle and does a weird wiggly finger dance]
Nono:  "Joint."  [makes movements with elbows]
Me:  "No, not 'joint'.  What do you call the joint on your finger?"
Nono:  "Finger joint."  [articulates at the knuckle]
Me:  [digging in purse for dictionary]  "Really?!  There's not a more specific word in French for knuckle?!"
Nono:  "Nop.  It's just 'joint'."
Me:  [Frantically flipping the pages in dictionary to find knuckle]  ABCDEFGH...M?!?  Grr...  "Ahhhhhh OKAY!  'Joint'!  You're right!" [triumphantly... trying to look cute to native French speakers who seem less satisfied with the outcome of this conversation]  So, then how would you say knuckle ba...?  Shut up, English speaking brain!  There's no baseball in France!!!  

Me:  "So hey cool!  I have the same dry skin thing on my finger joints as you do.  What is that?"
Nono:  "Dry skin."

WAH WAH!

Vocabulary:
Dry:  Sec (m), Seche (f)
Finger = la droigt
Joint = l'articulation
Knuckle = l'articulation
Paint = la peinture
Skin = la peau
Weird = bizarre

Me, Myself, and Bike!

Without my strict regimen of yoga, karate, agility, running, stairs, weights, rock climbing, and swimming, I must admit that I haven't really felt like myself lately (though this feeling might also stem from the fact that my digestive tract has been fermenting a fetus' weight in baguette and croissant dough for the last 3 days).  Oy!  This blog has really helped me to cope with my feelings of being culturally displaced and lonely, and when THAT doesn't work, the pastries always do (Haha!).  :)

In all seriousness though, my foot is feeling way better, so it's time to quit the sweets and ratchet up my training again!

On Saturday morning, I went to the Jour des Associations in Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire where, once a year, all the local clubs get together in one big room and do show and tell.  It was really cool to see all the different displays of what's going on here.  There was a table for rock climbing, karate, the pool and the library!

In the afternoon, a friend of the club took me out to coffee (At Lavazza, they offer cappuccinos with and without whipped cream - GENIUS!) and then he gave me his own personal bike!  I rode home and immediately signed up for the first group ride I could find - haha - YES!

On Sunday, I rode into town early to discover that downtown Tours had been taken over by the annual flea market.  Cool antiques and stolen stuff from all over Europe was displayed up and down the streets.  It was a real feast for the eyes!  Furniture, china, porcelain, chests, lamps, dolls, birdcages, records, photos, books, woodwork, paintings, cigar boxes, just everything...

At 3pm I met up with some local cyclists for a guided tour of all the streets in Tours named after famous doctors.  Cool, right?  Most of the riders were in their 60s (fit as fiddles and sharp as tacks) - a very tightly knit bunch.  They shit talked motorists almost as much as Billy and me!  I felt immediately in my element.  It was nice to get accustomed to how people ride here (very cautiously, but without helmets mind you).  I feel so happy to be back on a bike and riding everywhere all the time again!  I started feeling more like myself right away.

Today, I went to the Jardin Botanique.  It was really misty and empty.  Beautiful opportunity to reassess my goals for the season.  Tomorrow, I have a weight lifting date with another player on the team.  I'm very excited about this - in a super nerdy way!

That's all for now.  More later!

Day 1 - First Impressions

Welp!  After leaving SFO early yesterday morning and laying over in Atlanta (which was the bomb by the way - really really amazing terminal!), we finally touched down in Venice today.  The flight was empty (which explains why it cost an arm and a leg - haha!), so I snagged a whole row of seats to really get my money's worth outta the seating situation.  Unfortunately, that did not result in a copious amount of sleep, but anyways...  WAH!  Here's Louis on complaining about the plane situation...

 

Hahahaha!  Once we landed, Tim Kelly and I plus two other girls took off in a Meredes-Benz Mini Van for Maribor.  Here in Slovenia, the terrain is a lot like California.  On the way up we passed farms, vineyards, lots and lots of old growth HOPS, and many beautiful forests, mountains, and exposed limestone rock faces.  The countryside looked dry from my car window, but it was actually HOT and WET (my favorite!!). 

On the way up, we stopped to pick up snacks...  Mmmm... fresh cantaloupe, pineapple, and a mushy granny smith apple.  Everyone speaks English here!!  Haha...  I asked our driver who speaks Slovene fluently how to say "Hello.  Excuse me.  Where is your bathroom?"  He replied, "You just say, 'Hello.  Excuse me, where is your bathroom?'"  Ha!  

Once we got to the hotel, reality started to set it...  About half of the women who are trying out are here at the DRAS Center already.  We ate dinner together in the hotel restaurant (which has these two big wall-sized windows that look onto one of the indoor courts here).  The girls are all really nice, but it's clear what we're all here to do.  Everyone is still a little shocked from all the travel and getting used to things!  Can't wait for more!!

Well, it's lights out here.  Open gym tomorrow morning.  First meeting tomorrow evening, followed by a training session.  I'm very excited to be here...  More tomorrow.

Lahko noč!

Clear Your Mind - Wipe It Clean

Photo used with permission of Mr. Lyle.

Starting Bok Fu at West Wind Schools was a decision I made a year ago today because I wanted more self-discipline, self-control during confrontation, and better mind-body awareness.  Now, looking back over the last year, West Wind School has given me so much more than that...  The teachers there made me feel like family from the get go.  I am so thankful to my sensei Mr. Lyle for everything he's taught me over the last year.  He has encouraged me to push my limits!  

Family First

"The more I know, the less I know." - Paul DeCoux

"You can do anything, Amy.  You can be an Olympic volleyball player!" - Margaret DeCoux

The DeCoux family singers!  My life would be so empty without my sisters... They are my guides and my inspiration.