Day Thirty Three: A Centering of the Self
Distance: 49 mi.
Song of the Day: Superchunk — The Question is How Fast
7:30AM: Breakfast with Hanna and Nick at four-seater dining room table, scrambled eggs (with scrapple for Kyle), bread rolls and marmalade. We prepare our belongings like soldiers packing camp, a near-perfect routine allows us to cart in and out “off-bike” essentials in a single trip. Hanna decides to join us for a morning bike through Valdosta on her cobalt blue Rivendell; she says it’s a lot heavier than her Trek Madone carbon, which is true, but when I lift the steel touring bike it’s still fairly thin.
We stop into her favorite bike store but it’s closed; reroute downtown to find some coffee, strike out at a record store / coffee shop hybrid, it’s an afternoon joint. A stalky man in a Red Wings shirt confirms that Grassroots Coffee Co. is the place for us, and can be found behind the hand-made goods store we’re peering into. In we go to drink a smoothie and tell tales with Hanna. Lizzie chats with the barista, a transplant from the Northeast, about a curious anthropologist who popped into the store early in the morning, and the (mostly positive) culture shock she experienced when she moved to Valdosta. At one point Nick stops into the cafe and presents a flashlight to us; but it’s Hanna’s, not ours; after teasing Nick about how much his ‘throwaway’ hand-built wooden tables would sell for in Williamsburg hipsterdom he sneaks away, not one for small talk.
Before exiting we call Sophie and her the latest report about Nimh, our small cat in Brooklyn, and her bad behavior. Nimh is apparently experiencing protraction separation anxiety from Lizzie; she wrecks her vengeance by pooping on the doormat she otherwise never attends to, and ignoring her litterbox. We offer the best advice we can muster but we know it isn’t much. Sophie’s such a good sport — we simply couldn’t have come across a more consliderate and reliable occupant for our apartment.
We say goodbye to Hanna after she shows me her clip-in Shimano sandals. I’m envious, my feet roast in my closed toed mountain bike shoes. Hanna rides home to rest up before her afternoon Red Cross volunteer work.
11:30AM: I pull off into a ditch into Quitman, suggest an early lunch as I don’t see much for another 30 miles. It’s too hot to stand around fussing with iPhones so we dive into the diner directly across the street — the Morning Star Coffee House. It’s an immediate hit: they carry unsweet tea, and the cook sizes up Lizzie’s try at ordering a vegetarian omelet two hours beyond breakfast, decides to make it anyway, even improves upon reheated potato hash with a fresh batch. One of the patrons spreads the word that we’re biking through town (it’s a very small town); we’re soon greeted by two sisters who own the establishment asking if they can pray on us. We sit in quiet amazement, bellies full; I do not strain to hear or comprehend the words uttered but simply let it all wash over me. Lizzie then tries to pay and we’re told “Somebody has paid for you already.” Thank you, somebody, from two nobodies.
We leave with high spirits humming within us; they are immediately shaken by a passed off truck blaring his horn for no apparent reason, we’re nowhere near his lane. Reality cages us back into its myopic frame and we cautiously climb the foothills into Thomasville.
Twenty miles later we hit downtown Thomasville. In a half-rolling gas station frenzy we affirm our previous consideration to split up. Lizzie hits Wal-Mart looking for underwear, and I head downtown, drift through the resurgence of craft manufactories and hand-made goods. I visit a coffee shop once again to write. Minutes later Lizzie trounces in, glib about finding Star Wars underwear; baked goods are half priced in the evenings so we indulge.
Baked goods aren’t enough sustenance so we make big plans to eat a massive amount of Pizza, find Paulie’s Brick Over open for business. I drink an IPA with a bro-ish pun name and we eat a Greek salad to warm up. We neglect Sam and Meghan’s vegetarian pizza rule — repeat it with us, do not stray from peppers and onions or else you’ll be ‘soggy’ — order mushrooms, it’s so soggy you can’t ever eat it folden in half, you need to make your mouth a tunnel and zamboni the thing straight in, pushing with the crust.The pizza is predictably delicious, as suggested by our insane budding hunger as well as the bad action movie playing on the TV (all good pizza shops should have this.
Too full for the regrettable first three hundred feet on cobbled brick, we set our eyes on a fading sunset and flip-flop up the northern side of Thomasville to our stay in the woods.
8PM: Willis is preoccupied in town but sends the gate code and we encroach onto the property just as the sun sets. I shower outdoors in the zen garden; the dark garden almost has me believing there’s a magical aura repelling the gnats and ‘skeeters as I shower. I fiddle with the nozzle, which spores out water in unpredictable directions; find that if I press a single gummy nozzle the water will then shoot straight again. What a game! I fix the entire nozzle before noticing the mosquitos have arrived to soil my amusements.
We vault up the tent and huddle in as mystic pre-twilight drops behind us. Crickets rustle up their musings; one near us seems broken, imparting a somber scraping sound; maybe it needs new cricketing pads.
Sleep comes easy beneath the big blob waning moon.
3:42 AM: Something startles me awake from intense dreams; I glance around, soon beomce lit from within, my inner existence gapes toward the intense beauty pouring in all around me. Too riveting to sleep. A truck moans by with a sonorous wheeze; I reckon they’re two to three hours from 7AM delivery from Atlanta, or maybe Penscola. See the pine tree-tops divide the sky into sections of pale star dust….I remain awake with my insane thoughts…it’s as if this tent were a glass bottomed boat dipped into a black lake of stars… trees so erect in their trim moony silhouettes it’s as if I would topple them with a swift blow, a gentle push….Try to rouse Lizzie, she’s all mmhmms, no luck. Unending sky, won’t you be my bride tonight…what will Tallahassee be like…what do I wish it would be like…
