Today’s the day. Let’s see if I can mend my friend. I approach the day thinking I’m just going to have to go through the motions. I’m sure shit and happens have been up all night making plans and dropping turds in my diary so I might as well go tread on them and get it over with.
Now I must give a big up to Google here. They have got travel down to a fine art. I say where I want to go and it gives me everything I need from A to B, tracks me and updates me enroute, and leaves me with 2% battery to get home again. Get on a bloody bus. I haven’t been on one of those since I wore a school uniform. And then another. I do find putting myself at the mercy of other forms of transport over which I have no control very difficult. I just want to run t the front, jump into the driving seat and stand on the LOUD pedal.
I’m at the Potsdam dealer for 9. I’m sure I can smell shit. Or is that happens? Anyway.. “we would need to order it”. Of course you would. And I’m sure it would have to be delivered on the back of bees all the way from Austria. “But the Berlin dealer has one”. Ohhhh.. ok then. Could you phone them and reserve it please? Which he does. The repair place shuts at 6 I think, maybe 5 but it’s going to be tight and now I’m in a proper hurry. Get 2 buses back to the hotel to extend the room. “Yes… but you’ll have to change rooms”. Of course I will. I’VE GOT ALL THE FUCKING TIME IN THE WORLD LOVE.
Another bus, then a train, and another train right across Berlin. The trains are all delayed and running slow My mind is making plans again. I speed walk down to the dealers. Obviously there is no crushing need to get this done today. It could easily wait until tomorrow but this is one of my inherent failings. I rush. I move far too quickly through life and spend a lot of time, sitting down bored out my skull wishing I could have just relaxed and taken my time. Memories are priceless and I’ve got an absolute shit tonne of them I can run to but just stopping sometimes and breathing something in properly is just as important and I often miss that step out. It’s just more infighting in my head that does it, trying to keep everyone satisfied and fit the absolute maximum into every day. I can be a real curse though, and I know it.
Get to the dealers, they can’t remember any phone call. The lady tap tap taps on the computer. “We have only one” .
Now I’m sure I spot a family resemblance here in the way she smiles as she says it. “I know you. You’re Mrs Shit aren’t you. Did your little twat of a son put you up to this?”
She just keeps smiling and sends someone out back while I contemplate buying the fastest bike in the shop and riding it into the nearest bridge. He comes back out and he has 2 bearings. Maybe these two are a double act. Germans are known for their sense of humour after all. TWATS. Pay the money, turn and run.
It’s gone 1. Probably 3 pm before I get to the repair place. The window is closing. It’s going to be another day I just know it. The trains are all delayed. They are all waiting on the tracks and in stations for ages and ages. I hear an announcement. “We are sorry for the delay. The person responsible is being taken to the woods to be shot”. Well good, but this is really fucking with my swede. I could fix the bike in an hour at home but I don’t have all the tools I need with me. I’ll probably have to do it tomorrow. Fucky soapy suddy tit wanks .. which doesn’t sound like a bad option just at this moment ..
Get back gone 3, jump into my leathers and walk round to the repair place about 3:45. The bloke I spoke to on Saturday isn’t there. They say they’re leaving in an hour. My heart sinks. I gave it my best shot. But then he phones his mate I saw at the weekend, then tells me he will lend me some tools and I can get on with it. I hear singing. I hear a gospel choir. I hear fucking HALLELUJA. And I’m away on the Ktm speed changing olympics. 15 minutes and she’s gutted. I’ve got the yoke off and can see the bearings. Fuck me. That looks … serious. My brain immediately starts to think that I was on the autobahn with it like that, and then it starts looking at a few “what if” scenarios. Before I know it I see a blue screen of death and my brain reboots. It can’t go there. I’m going to designate that particular wormhole as “Chernobyl” and stay the fuck away from it.
The bloke helps me twat off the broken bearing and it falls apart. He’s never seen one do that before apparently. That’s good to know. My mate reckons that they look overtightened but these have been in over 20k now so I think its more likely the absolute twatting they took on the Pamir last year is more likely the culprit. They’ve been fine until the last couple of days too.
The top bearing is fine and in the name of expediency I leave it in for now. We take the (very heavily marked) shell out and replace that too then it’s blur mechanics again for 15 minutes and she all dressed ready to go. I give them all the cash I have and ride off back to the hotel with a massive fuck off smile on my face
I’ll go and buy myself some cock slippers from the local sex shop to celebrate. And some latex too. That looks very practical actually. Wipe clean and stain proof. I bet it makes an excellent noise with you go down a slide at the park in it too.
Is it me, or is there a manufacturing fault with this?
Now. Before I go tonight I want you all to make me a promise. I want you to never mention any potential scenarios that could have unfolded had the bearings given out at any other point than they did. Can we all agree on that? I’ve had a word with shit and happens. I’ve showed them the pictures and I’ve explained that they went way too far this time. If they don’t want to spend the rest of their lives with me pulling them along by choke collars round their cocks then they’re going to have to calm down.
Get the bike out the garage and ride out into the soft yellow light. The rest of the spectrum will come later but for now yellow is perfect. The Bitch feels flighty and loose and ready to dance. It feels like someone has swapped her heavy black boots to ballet shoes overnight. I’m slightly nervous of throwing her around too much though, mainly because she was in bits a few hours ago and I was in a hurry
It’s about 420 dull motorway miles to my brother’s in Holland for the night. Then back to via the tunnel.
Out we go to follow the fat black strip home. Chore to door. 800 miles in autopilot, mind back in muse control. Now is the golden hour. The Bitch is relaxed and happy. She’s not threatening to eject me any time soon. My mind can stand down the emergency team and allow itself a little time to indulge in some introspection To have an honest word with itself before its invaded with the everyday. Food shopping. Worming the sink and unblocking the dog. Brushing the lawn and watering the cat. The usual bollocks we all fill our days with.
And this is where is gets tricky. How can you really be honest with yourself? It’s a very difficult thing to do. Honesty often involves being critical. Opening wounds and not just stopping as soon as your brain tells you stuff you don’t want to hear. Fuck I spend half my time on these trips ripping off old scabs and picking at them till they bleed. I drive myself to tears looking at what an absolute cu*t I’ve been at times in my life. I really don’t know why my mind does this to me. Perhaps wearing a helmet stops these thoughts from just evaporating as they normally would. Perhaps it’s guilt and this is penance from all this selfish pleasure I get to experience when I’m away. I can, without any doubt be a quite monumental prick at times though and I can often be completely dismissive of pretty well the rest of humanity too. I’m a complicated concoction of conflicting, often non complimentary characteristics. Parts of me are running about in my brain telling me to just stop typing. Nobody wants to hear this shit. And part of me doesn’t want anyone to know anyway. Part of me would love to go to a psychiatrist and get some sort of analysis, but another part of me would be extremely disappointed with myself if I did. I should delete all that. Or maybe not. Sometimes I feel like I just say ‘help me’, but only in an extremely quiet whisper. Fuck I don’t know. Just get me the dog and a plunger and let me get back to normal.
Fact is we’re all many things. We all have different faces, some more than others. Even my forever patient and understanding wife only knows a few me’s. There are many many me’s that she will never ever meet. We all walk a very fine line and jump from one person to another to make our passage through life as smooth as possible.
Part of the lure of these trips is the fact that I take off that pressure to conform and do what I think is expected of me all the time. If I get up and the absolute c*nt personality won the fight to inhabit me for the day then I just let it knock itself out. This isn’t real life. I don’t have relationships to maintain. I just have to live with myself. On this trip I’ve had a LOT of spectacularly happy days when I’ve just twisted the wrist and watched the world go by. Where opening the door in a hotel or a cafe has been like unwrapping a present. When laugher has just erupted for no reason. When just a look has made me well up inside. I’ve had grey days when I’ve felt completely vacant. I’ve had days where my head has felt fit to burst with the pressure of trying to work a way out of a problem. I’ve had days I’ve wanted to be anywhere else but where I am, and other days I just wanted to go on forever. I’ve had everything I want and more
And as much as Shit and Happens have driven me to distraction at times, these trips would not be the same without those little tosspots. They have exercised all my ingenuity and patience and have taken me right right down to the bottom but the high that comes with the climb back out has always been more than worth the trouble. They’ve scared the fucking bejesus out of me on a few occasions too. I remember mentally checking out once or twice, convinced it was all over, only for the chaos to choose to open a gap rather than close tight right in front of me. They also seem to have completely screwed my attitude to danger. Like they’ve gone into a secret room in my head, found a big red switch and just flicked it off. It’s really not healthy. You wouldn’t want me to do a risk assessment for you, you can be sure of that
Anyway, time for a stop at a place that inspires absolutely no emotional response. None at all. Fuck, I thought that persona had been deleted years ago. That one has got me into trouble on more than one occasion. I don’t want the wife to know its still in there somewhere either.
Then another. A spanking new bakery that’s had a woman called ’sunflower’ come in as a consultant and wave her arms about shouting about trends and vibes and instagram stories but managed to create a lifeless, soulless and completely anodyne experience. Why can’t these people just leave these buildings the fuck alone. The buildings have far more character than the vacuous oxygen thieves that come in to ‘transform’ them. Grips my shit!
Its getting bloody hot and my tongue has swollen up to a big round lump giving me two options. I either hire myself out for extreme cunnilingus or I call the emergency dairy hotline. My call is answered immediately and I’m told to meet them at the nearest Lidl ASAP for treatment. The dairy dealer meets me, goes and grabs a cold cow from the fridge and holds it over my head, squeezing the teats into my mouth until milk starts coming out my ears. When I walk to the bike I make a sound like feet in wellington boots full of water. Absolutely perfect.
Get into Holland, land of the ‘saddle sniffers’. Apparently this is slang for cyclists who have a habit of cleaning or inspecting their saddles. I’ve always thought it was about an all together different activity. Hey. Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. Get to my brothers place and meet reality again. Not the full-on reality, but an essential part of the rehabilitation process for me.
Get The Bitch out the garage and get out on the road to Calais. I do love . I really wouldn’t want to live anywhere else, and as much as I love to travel there is no way I could do it forever.
Before I know it I’m back outside my house. Back where I started, all done and dusted. At some point in the future it will be the very last time, but not this time. I’m not done yet. And neither is The Bitch.
This trip has been an unusual one. In some ways the worst, but in other ways the best, but ultimately it’s been a bust and I’m going to have to come to terms with that as the nights draw in and I hibernate in front of a roaring fire. When this persona roams around in the winter darkness of my head, never being allowed near any of the controls. Never been taken out for any exercise. Never been allowed near a keyboard. Never answering any questions. Never have anybody take any interest in it at all. This persona finds writing a cathartic exercise and an outlet for thoughts and emotions that are never expressed to any real live humans. You’re not real. You’re all just letters and emojis on a screen. You don’t actually stand in front of me and turn these words into any sort of reality. You don’t call my bluff. And that all helps me survive. So thanks for that. I really appreciate it.
So now the door is closing until the next time. Thanks for listening. Next time you see my normal everyday persona checking out, my stare going out to 1000 yards, my mind going into standby mode, and you hear the sound of faint footsteps running into the distance, you’ll have a good idea of just where I’ve gone