Sometimes, I get grumpy about having to do things: I don’t want to go to work. I know I’ll feel better if I do, but I don’t want to go running. I don’t want to make dinner.
There are whole hosts of things I sometimes petulantly don’t want to do, but usually, it’s not about the thing itself–it’s about being tired of the routine. If I don’t want to go running, it’s probably because I’ve been running the same (or similar) route for too long and I’m starting to get bored. If I don’t want to go to work, perhaps I’m not excited about what I’m currently working on. Generally, switching something up will get me back into it.
This is what happened with last weekend’s OR Randonneurs 100k ride that I was super excited about initially. Somewhere between posting about it on this blog and then actually riding to the start of it, I got to feeling grumpy. I didn’t want to ride a ride I rode last year. I didn’t want to follow a cue sheet. I didn’t want to have this experience that for whatever reason seemed old and tired to me.
What I did want to do was see all the other people riding it, and then do my own thing. Which is what I did. I rode to the start in Forest Grove, hung out with everyone getting ready to ride it, and then took off for my own exploratory ride, all around Forest Grove, Hillsboro, and a long and convoluted way back to and around Portland.
It was exactly what I needed. A ride where I had no idea what to expect put the thrill back into a Saturday full of biking; giving myself total license to take whatever road looked interesting at the time made me all the more excited to be out.
Would I have enjoyed the 100k ride if I’d made myself do it? Probably. I’m sure that once I started it I would have warmed up to the idea. The roads it covers are lovely, and it was a great day for biking. But I’m pretty psyched that I got my own exploratory and meandery bike ride in. Sometimes you’ve gotta switch it up, yknow? :)