Last evening Timothy Shenk, Kristen Swartley, and I, along with my roommate Cheryl Heatwole, celebrated the Hebrew tradition of Shabbat (the Jewish sabbath) at suppertime, passing around a glass of wine (grape juice) and breaking bread around the table (er, ok, so it was cheese sandwiches), while reflecting on our week since last Friday. Tim looked behind him at the microwave which read a time of 7:00, and asked, “Kendra! Where were we this time exactly one week ago?” I felt myself start to smile: “Bikemovement!” In fact, both he and I were sound asleep in the restaurant in Ocean City, drooling into our elbows as we waited for our food to arrive. A couple hours before that, we’d all biked onto the boardwalk and sprinted into the Atlantic Ocean, hardly believing that we were all the way on the other side of a huge expanse of land called the U.S., which we had just crossed on our bikes. Of course we celebrated: we gave each other big bear hugs in the water, posed for pictures, splashed, shouted, laughed, carried on—in short, made quite the stir and even turned quite a few heads. One woman walked up to Alicia and gave all the money in her pockets to our cause, even though she didn’t even know what that was. We felt triumphant, proud, and happy—to be done, but most of all, to have done it.

Fast-forward one week later, and I’m back at EMU with homework, SGA meetings and cross country practice. By now I have regained a semi-normal metabolism, gotten reaccustomed to my relatively huge wardrobe, stopped noticing my tan lines so much (though they likely won’t fade until next summer), and even enjoyed running today, for the first time since temporarily becoming a biker. Showers are a given, my biking clothes aren’t seeing nearly so much wear, I’m back to checking my mail at least twice a day, and it isn’t unusual to sometimes go hours at a time without exercise.

But other than that, I’m not sure what “post-Bikemovement” is supposed to mean, because in a sense, I’ve been trying to keep its ideas and ideals going. Which is hard, it really is. Not only do I often fail at much of it, but, let’s face it, “real life” cannot be Bikemovement in its purest form: concerning oneself with little more than the tasks of biking, eating, sleeping, and talking; having the focus of a single goal to bike towards every day; constant community with people and nature; watching life roll by at 15 mph; having nowhere to be except the end of the road at the end of the day. It’s a simple life, and therefore unattainable by college students purely by definition.

And yet I do not lose hope. In Andrea Weaver’s words, Bikemovement was “the self-help guide to walking through life in a very meaningful, colorful, and interesting way,” and the lessons we’ve learned from it continue to apply: real relationships, honest conversation, adventure, vulnerability, authenticity… And I continue to apply them. These days I notice myself saying things I never thought I’d be brave enough to say (but meaning every word), being vulnerable in my relationships like I never believed safe or possible, keeping my ears open to what people are saying and how I might learn from that, no matter what perspective they’re coming from. I’m hyper-aware of other people’s opinions, and my own, and making sure those don’t interact in negative ways; I earnestly seek out other people’s advice; I journal two hrs/day, often just to get to the bottom of whatever emotion I’m currently feeling; I comfortably take advantage of other people’s generosity/hospitality, assuming it is genuinely offered; I jump at the chance to go for a bike ride; I try to keep things simple and stress-free as much as possible (which, just in the past week, hasn’t been very often at all); I continue to come up with exciting ideas and do crazy things that make my mom shake her head and say, “My only worry is that you’ll never be able to settle down.” ?

In those ways and many more, I still act like and count myself as a current Bikemovement participant, because, even though my rate of growth—my “pace”—has slowed down considerably (it feels like I’ve gotten off my bike and started to walk!) the journey towards personal growth and development continues, step by step.

So now it’s time for me to come up with a neatly packaged phrase, to challenge and leave you all with—ooh here, I have just the one: Live the journey!

Oops, wait, someone already took that one. That’s ok, what I really meant was:

Vive Bikemovement!

Peace,
Kendra

Posted by Kendra Nissley

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 3rd, 2006 at 5:16 am and is filed under Reflections - Post Trip. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.