I felt something when I grabbed a handful of brakes but it was something wrong. Fear. Something I was rightful in feeling. But something that wasn’t real until I created that very real reality–the fall. That reality that could have been recreated by emotion, a new emotion albeit false or learned.
Do we accept that we will fall? Do we ride and hope that we never will? Somewhere in between maybe. I fell that day. I fell another day. On the track I tried to keep pace with a group of riders taking that final left going into a chicane and I soon was looking off the track and then, into the dirt. I looked and went.
Where we are looking is where we will go. Look through the turn. Sometimes our body tells us what is real. But sometimes we have to learn. What feels most uncomfortable may be the safest of places.
It’s a constant dance with Mr. Flight and Mr. Flight. Sometimes it makes sense to run. Or maybe it always makes sense. Is it rational to fight with danger? Or is it even less rational to run from it? We can run from danger our entire lives. Some do. Some try. Some fight with danger their entire lives. Some Embrace it. Dance with it. Some dance with it so that danger is no longer danger anymore. Or rather. Doesn’t seem so. They learn that it is okay to be banked at maximum lean angle in turns because they have never hit a gravel patch or ice. Some experience the opposite. And learn that it is better to be level. Some learn it is better to be on 4-wheels. Some learn it is better to never die. Or rather to never grit their teeth at the possibility of it, face to face. Some learn it is better to never live. To run and sprint through peril and joy and depths of sorrow and folly. Some learn that to live is to succumb and some learn that to live is to die. Some learn a different concept of life altogether. One of facts. Some just learn and live by fiction. And this fiction becomes their reality. They look through the turn and they believe therein is safety…because of how it feels. But perhaps that is just safety from everything else besides death. Sometimes you protect yourself in the worst ways possible. Dragons aren’t real. And science is safety , wisdom and bliss.
Some learn through experience. Some through books. Some through emotion. Some through others. Some learn and some stay the same. Some learn the same things. Some learn to fear. Some learn to walk. Some learn to crawl because of the dampened risk of falling. Some learn to run. Some learn to drive. Some to ride.