Pole-Dancing Coda

If I were to document all of the crazy things that happen in my life, the coincidences and incidences of serendipity and synchronicity I have no control over and yet have come to expect....if I were to document all of those, I wouldn't be able to write about anything else here. I said once to a friend, after a particularly strange encounter with someone else, "What the fuck? Why did that happen?" And he said, "Because it's your story and that's the kind of thing that always happens in your story. It had to happen that way." My story. Here's an example.

Remember the guy I was dancing with last Friday night at the club? Before the pole-dancing? I was sitting at a stop light downtown this morning, on my way to deliver my jars to Chicken Grrrl's house for our bi-weekly raw milk run. I felt someone watching me, so I looked to the right.....and there was Ron, the guy who thought I was at the club with my son that night, sitting in a new black Chevy pickup grinning and nodding his head at me. I smiled back and gave a little wave. He gave a big wave and wiggled his eyebrows at me. Then I just looked forward and felt kind of awkward. I could see out of the corner of my eye he was still looking.* The light turned green and we pulled forward a block to the next red light. It finally turned green and he gave a wave and turned right while I went straight.

What are the odds? I live in a smallish city, but not that small. Oh, I admit it is small enough to pinch sometimes, and more-so lately. It's great to run into people I want to see and not so great to run into people I don't, but the former far outweigh the latter....not in pounds of course, but in numbers. And then there's just ... awkward. Not my type, Ron. Probably too nice given my track record. Even with the shiny black pickup and the Harley my son is sure he rides, not my type. I swear the Universe fucks with me just so she can laugh at me at happy hour with her friends.

I'm preparing for a new quarter, which starts next Wednesday. I sat at my computer beating my head against assignments and lesson plans so long today I got a headache, so I took off on a solitary ride. I haven't ridden by myself in a while, but I like to do it now and then. I usually go faster when I'm alone, really push it, but tonight I was doggish. My body didn't want to fall into a rhythm, and a hot wind blew up in my face and sucked the moisture out of my mouth. I rode six miles and then turned around. I didn't hit my stride until about nine miles and then it was slower than usual.

Not many cyclists shared the path with me tonight, but there were other people. Lots of walkers, people with dogs. One woman on in-line skates who must have skated miles. I passed her coming and going. A skinny boy...young man?....with no shirt and his pants falling down past his butt over his boxers walked in the middle of the path, talking on his phone and carrying a crossbow in his right hand. Was I uncomfortable passing him and giving him my back? Indeed I was. A couple of miles later, a large doe ran across the path and disappeared into the woods. She looked so powerful as she ran.

The fountains were shooting over the river as I rode back. I noticed the guys ahead of me were all taking the ramp up to the top of the levy. I slowed down to decide whether to ride up or just ride through. In the photo you can just see the bike path in the left, bottom corner. It curves around under the fountain that shoots from the levy. I decided to lower my head to protect my glasses and ride through. On a 90-degree day, a little river water feels pretty refreshing. I was dry a mile down the path.

Twelve miles isn't bad, but it felt like twenty. It goes that way though. Sometimes twenty feels like ten.

Tomorrow's post will be about something scientists found on the female body. Something small and apparently elusive. Someday I swear I'm just going to open a sex blog. Would anybody read it?

*Those years of basketball developed my peripheral vision for life. My kids still think I have eyes in the back of my head.