Day 69 Ames to Des Moines

 

Day 69 Ames to Des Moines

 

     There is an extensive network of bike trails throughout Iowa and Illinois.  It is very soothing to cycle away from cars and to have few stop signs.  It enables one to look out over the landscape and to aware of one’s sense of sight and smell.  The constant attention one pays to the dangers while riding on the road has a cumulative effect on one’s stress level.  This allows me to sing while I pedal:

 

The light of passion in dreamy eyes

The Page of truth well read

The glorious thrill in a heart gone cold

Of a spirit once thought dead

The song that goes to a comrade’s heart

The tear of pride let fall

My heart grows brave

And the world to me

Is a good world after all

 

Rest for your eyes are weary love

We drove the worst away

The ghost of the man I might have been

Is gone from my heart today

We’ll live for life and the best it brings

Till our twilight shadows fall

My heart grows brave

And the world to me

Is a good world after all.

 

   I was cycling from Ames to Des Moines to see Sam Greer, whom I had not seen in 45 years.  I worked with him in Oregon Caves National Monument when I was just out of high school.  It was an experience although this was a very long time ago, our friendship has transformed and nourished at various times in my life.  I discovered, among other things, the truth and power of Hamlet’s words to Horatio “There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” 

 

    In the intervening years he became an anesthesiologist and I became a priest and both became respectable members of society.  When we met again, I was reminded of the curious and excitable teenager who still remains within me.  When I got off my bike we hugged and I asked “how’s the surgery business?”  He replied “a bloody mess!” 

 

    It was a joy to meet his wife, Kim and to tell him about my wife and children.  I spoke of the grown up I am pretending to be.  He was getting ready to fly up to the arctic to hunt musk ox the next week.   I then discovered that there is a joie de vivre lurking in the heart of the most respectable of persons.  I am grateful that Kim drove me to Davenport the next day where I spent the night Dustin and Jodi in his printing shop.