A Lone Star and December’s Green Fairways
The change from summer to winter clothes never felt this good!
I don’t get excited about changing summer clothes for winter wear, but last week’s swap had a moment that set my pulse racing.
My wife, Lynn, and I live in a townhome with closet space too small to hold both winter and summer wardrobes. One day in mid-November I adopted a semi-squat walking stance, to waddle under the floor-joist-cieling of our home’s crawl space where we store most of our cold weather clothes during the summer. Ten locking lid bins held coats, scarves, hats, and more. Keeping my back and knees bent, I moved each bin to the crawl space door, where I could hand it off to Lynn standing in our garage. Crunched over, kept my head from knocking on the joists, but a strong dull ache gripped my lower back. From the garage, Lynn got the bins up two flights of stairs, into some loft space outside our bedroom.
We haven’t needed winter clothes even during this year’s late fall on Lake Tahoe. The area has seen little snow and has been mostly warm and dry so on a morning last week, my eyes half open as I left our bed’s warm down duveés, I stepped around those bins on the way to the kitchen. My mind wasn’t thinking about winter, only that first bitter sip of a hot cup of dark roast.
Later that morning, as I walked our 17lb. Jack Russel Terrier, Archie, past a closed golf course’s snowless, green fairways, I paused when a wind gust chilled the skin on my bare hands and face. A few miles away, the crumbling granite and volcanic rock summit of Relay Peak, the highest point on the Tahoe Rim Trail, vanished into the clouds. For the first time for me this fall, it felt like I needed to dress in less cotton and more wool.
That afternoon, I started moving my extra shorts out of our bedroom closet, putting some midweight thermal shirts on the newly cleared shelf space. As I placed the shirts on the shelf, a blue-backed white star on the front of a cycling jersey caught my eye. I pulled the shirt of its hangar and holding it in my hands put me back in the saddle of my Seven Alaris road bike. This Radere Lone Star Cycling Jersey was the only one I owned when I trained for the 2024 Triple Bypass, a 118-mile, single-day bike ride with over 10,000 feet of elevation gain crossing three of Colorado’s Rocky Mountain passes.
Grey stains traverse the shirt’s inside collar and back pocket stitching, wash-proof relics of my sweat from the more than 700 miles of riding. The Texas state flag design is not why I bought polyester garment after finding it at a second-hand store. I liked it for the three deep pockets along the lower back, where I could keep energy bars, water bottles, a balaclava, and gloves.
Holding this piece of gear in my hands, I felt like I’d run into an old friend. My heartbeat quickened with excitement as I remembered donning the Lone Star for my first Bypass training ride. That early April day, 6-foot walls of snow lined each side of Juniper Pass’s dry paved road making for a frigid descent back to our Evergreen home. I stumbled into the house before shedding the jersey and wrapping myself in a down coat. I flipped on the ignite switch of our gas fireplace. Seated in front of the flames, my convulsing frame and cold, aching toes gradually warmed.
The jersey reminded me of my slow ascent in late June through the pine forests above Silver Plume, and then through the rock and grass slopes of Loveland Pass where there’s not enough oxygen for trees to grow. I reached the pass’s 11,990-foot summit, confident I was ready to ride the Triple Bypass.
That July morning of the Bypass, Lynn drove me to the start so that I could begin the ride at 5a.m The 118-mile route goes from Evergreen to Avon, Colorado. Lynn and our good friends, Seth and Debbie, would meet me at the finish line, then we would all ride back home in our car.
I stood in front of Lynn, my toes turned upwards in my cleats, feeling a little awkward and nervous about the work ahead of me when our eyes met. The tears forming on her lashes welled up a sadness in my gut and I could feel my own eyes quivering.
“Good luck and be careful. I love you!” She said. But what I think she was really saying was “I’m right here with you. I love you!”
My bike riding, like a lot of things in my life, often fools me into thinking I’m alone. Cold grips my body on a descent or my heart pounds on a steep ascent. The discomfort forces out any other thoughts and all I am thinking about is how to feel better, how to get rid of the hurt. But, I’m not alone. Even when we’re physically apart, myself on the bike, Lynn at the finish line, she’s with me. Before most of my training rides, Lynn made sure I had the right fuel and gear. She constantly encouraged my training.
The mountain views I saw completing the Triple Bypass, the ride’s flight-like descent of Loveland Pass, the refreshing plunge into Avon’s Nottingham Lake after I crossed the finish line, Lynn gave me these gifts.
We still haven’t needed much in the way of winter clothing this fall, but thank god I changed my wardrobe. Right in front of me, was a Lone Star reminding me that Lynn is always with me and she’s given me some things that make my heart race.