A Different Kind of Challenge

“I haven’t ridden a bike since I was, like, five.”

“Can this seat get any lower? It has been forever since I have done this.”

“Oh, pedal brakes! That is so fun! Like kindergarten!”

“Only four miles? Any hills? No? Okay, I think I can do this.”

And off we go. My relationship to biking has changed dramatically in the last few months. Instead of crossing the windswept, molten hot deserts of the Wind River Range in Wyoming with my son, wondering where we will next find food, water and shelter, now I cycle daily on a three-speed beach cruiser down a sweet little bike path that connects a few historic lighthouses, leading tours for tourists, who ooh and ah over the beauty of the southern Maine coast. And you know what? I love it.

Don’t get me wrong, not everybody who comes to Lighthouse Bikes is a novice cyclist, it is just that those are my favorite. They wobble around on the side street practicing braking and switching gears, and their faces flicker from intense concentration to wide grins, like blinking sunlight through the leaves. It is a thing of mine, this love of seeing people step just a little bit out of their comfort zones, and watching their confidence and mastery grow. It is like I get to watch them all be kids again–just for a moment. Away from their offices and piles of dishes and oil changes. It is playing and learning and being open to something just a little bit new, a little bit adventurous.

I feel like a kid again, too. A tired kid. All this is so new to me. I have never been a business owner! Everyday I am making mistakes and correcting and recorrecting again and again. It is like learning to steer. Everyday I am fixated on trying to learn new systems from bike repair to computer use to the history of Portland. There are days when I come home in the evening barely verbal and actually yearn for the sun to go down so that I can slip quietly off to my bed and sleep. I feel hungry for it. Just like a child.

What’s more, I have always been terrified of public speaking, and now I have to do it everyday, all day long. I used to hate it so much that I would cut class in high school and take a big fat “F” for the grade rather than stand in front of a crowd and talk. My knee caps would literally shake, the patellas bouncing up and down, visibly trembling, and my neck would blossom with huge red blotches–announcing my anxiety to everyone around. The repetitive nature of the tour has thankfully quieted this, but it was a great hurdle to leap. A different kind of a challenge, but a challenge nonetheless.

So, those customers who wobble this way and that? Who are embarrassed about their lack of skill? Who are exhausted at the end of our ride? I get them. And I also understand their grins that break out after their small successes. My grin is breaking out, too, every time someone walks out of the shop happy. One day I will get back out on an epic trip, but for now this is adventure enough.