DAY 30

Day 30

Monday, July 19, 2010

Rugby to St. Michael’s, ND

81 miles

Let me begin by showing you this picture. Rugby, ND is the geographical center of North America.

Today we had a long ride, 81 miles. On days like this, the guides provide a prepared lunch at the sag/van. So at mile 50, there they were, with tomatoes, cheese, lettuce, and turkey to fold into wrap sandwiches, along with cookies, cold Diet Coke, and tunes blaring out of the Subaru sag: Alison Krause and the Union Station, and Bob Dylan’s “Modern Times.” Everyone lingered, laughing, swaying to the music, dancing, sitting in the shade of the trailer and talking.











And I thought as I anticipated writing about this, there’s no way to convey just how special this moment was without telling about what had preceded it last Friday. I’d thought I would write about Friday’s event as an addendum once I returned from the ride. Now I know that I really have to describe it here so it won’t be the last part of the blog.

Last Friday morning, my friend Barbara, who was my collision buddy (and was pictured on a previous post), was doing what she loved best – biking in warm weather, with a gentle tailwind. She often biked alone, since her recumbent bike is lower to the ground, and her speed is generally slower. One of her greatest pleasures on this trip was biking every foot of the way up Logan Pass at the Continental Divide, and making it there by 10:45 am (Remember, 11 am was the deadline, since bikes weren’t allowed on that road between 11 am and 4 pm).

Anyway, there’s no way to ease into telling this gently: on Friday at 11:30 am, Barbara was hit by a Ford F-150 and killed. The driver said he’d slowed, but hit her rear wheel. She was thrown about twenty feet from her bike. On Saturday, several from our group placed flowers at the site. I didn’t go, and it seemed creepy to me. But those who did were glad they did so. They said the skid marks only started after the location of the crash, not before; so it’s questionable that he tried to stop or avoid her. A criminal investigation is under way.

Obviously, this sent us all into a tailspin. It was both ironic and important that our scheduled layover day (two nights in one place) began right there in Minot at the end of biking on Friday. We were all in disbelief that this could happen. We talked about Barbara. Some speculated on how she died. Some spent lots of time at their computers trying to get more information. Some wondered if she suffered, though it appears that she died instantly. Some of us just went for walks.

I’d mentioned earlier that the president of Womantours came to spend time with us. We had a joint dinner with groups #1 and #2, because the end of their layover coincided with the beginning of ours. The next day, Saturday, we had a 2pm meeting of just our group #2 to talk more about this tragedy and to see how people were doing. By then I just wanted to get out of there. I already didn’t feel safe on route 2. Three people of the 28 were making plans to go home, and although I wanted to bolt out of there myself, I couldn’t get travel arrangements to work.

Later, sitting at my computer in the motel room, I heard three sharp knocks at my door. It was Carolyn. “I’m here to invite you to a party in my room.” So I went, and as I sat down, I saw that it was a wine and cheese gathering with all the SAG drivers, my current roommate, and another biker friend. Nancy began, “Lynn, we want you to know that we want you to stay, and we don’t want you to leave the group.” I became a puddly mess, crying and laughing at their thoughtfulness. They said if I hadn’t agreed to come to their “party,” they all would have ganged up on me and made me come. They called it an intervention. Nicest intervention I could have imagined. They told me to sag the whole way to Fargo if I wanted; just stay with the group.

Looking back, that was the turning point of a really, really horrible event. I did choose not to bike on Sunday, not only as my own way of affirming life, but also because that stupid highway was scary even when I had survived biking it and Barbara had not. I didn’t need to do any more of it.

On Sunday, everybody wore their Womantours jerseys, along with black necklaces in a show of solidarity with Barbara. They all cycled out of town en masse, and I took pictures of them before climbing into the van as a passenger for the day. I noticed as we later passed them, that everybody was biking in groups of three or four. Many of us usually prefer biking alone, but not on that day.

Today, Monday, I did bike the 81 miles, and the light-hearted tone had begun to return among all of us. The scenery was lovely, and the sky was moody, with grey clouds punctuated by a few streaks of lightning, even at 8:30 am. Interestingly, as we biked toward the direction of the lightning, the clouds moved to our left, and we escaped showers altogether.

And this brings me back to our lunch together at mile 50. I don’t know if it’s because we have only three more biking days after today, or because Barbara’s death gave us pause, but nobody biked like bats out of hell today. We savored the ride, the lunch, the company of good people, and the chance to be silly, swaying to the music of Bob Dylan.

IN MEMORIUM, BARBARA MINNICK

Where you are now, it's always sunny, in the low 70's, with a gentle tailwind, a wide shoulder, light traffic, and you get to call to others as you pass them, "On your left!"