Notes from the Tour, 1.

We had been biking at a pace which quickly became grueling for my body, which was not just putting forth the effort to cycle 60-80 miles a day in headwinds and through the California coast's numerous hills, but also to mend a still-broken bone. On the morning of our eighth day, my touring partner assured me that we only had sixty miles to cover, a relatively short stretch. Around mile 15 or so, I realized that this sixty miles included all of Big Sur along the Pacific Coast Highway (the 1). There are a lot of steep hills along that stretch, folks.

Around mile 40, I began to curse my partner, who I had not seen for 30 miles. I had no cell phone reception, and no maps. I wasn't sure about which campsite we were staying at that night. And I was tired, angry, and mostly, scared. I began to fight back tears every other mile. Each hill filled me with dread; I would pause, look behind me and survey all of the terrain and all of those hills I had already conquered and wonder, how would I make it up yet another climb?

I knew I needed to let go of my fear. I would tell myself in my most motherly voice, "Just let go. You're afraid of the next ten miles, but you only need to pedal for this instant. You are not at your limit yet. This is only fear!" As I reached mile 50, I began to become encouraged again. "It's only 10 more miles! You can bike any 10 miles, no matter how hilly! You can always do ten miles!

This worked until about mile 60. Then, I began to argue with that motherly voice, "Yes, but what about the pain? How do you let go of the pain? That is not just in my head, that is aching through my body!"

And then, I hit mile 65. I had arrived at the Henry Miller museum, closed, of course, by that time. It was not the campsite just like the three other Big Sur attractions I had recently passed were not the campsite. There were still no signs for the campsite, and the strangers I had asked along the way had been telling me "five more miles" for the last fifteen miles. I no longer believed them. Further, I no longer had numbers to play with; I had passed the 60-mile mark, and had no idea how far that campsite actually was from where I sat.

I pulled off into the parking lot of the museum, leaned my bike against a tree, sat down in a wooden chair, and sobbed. I had indeed reached my limit; perhaps not physically, but emotionally. The games I played with myself were no longer working, Yo La Tengo could no longer distract me, and there was another small hill to climb if I was to leave that museum. I could no longer tell myself, "It's only sixty miles!" It had already been 65.

After about 20 minutes of heaving, self-pitying, all-out wailing, a man drove his car over to where I sat. His window down, he leaned out and said, "Ma'am, I haven't heard someone cry like that in a long time. What's got you so upset?"

I explained that I had been biking for quite some time, had no cell phone reception, didn't know where my touring partner or the campsite was, and just could not bike one more mile. He then explained that he knew the owner of the museum, would go talk to him, and that I could probably just camp at the museum that night. After he introduced himself, Todd told me to sit right there, settle myself down, and wait while he went and spoke with the owner about my camping prospects.

I'll admit, while I was somewhat creeped out by the idea of sleeping by myself in a closed, empty museum, I was also quite intrigued. It would certainly be more interesting than the hiker/biker sites we had stayed in up to this point.

While Todd was gone, a 20-something, sporty couple approached the closed front gate to examine the literature regarding the museum's and Henry Miller's history. I asked them if they knew of a campsite just north of the museum. They responded that they did know of one--20 miles north.

I began sobbing again.

The girl began rushing toward me, asking "Why are you so sad? No, don't cry! What's wrong?" I hic-upped my story out to them, and they offered to put my bicycle (Frank) on their car's bike rack and drive me to the campsite.

The only other time I have ever hitchhiked was during a high school spring break vacation in the Cayman Islands, where absolutely everyone hitchhikes. But I had absolutely no hesitation at that point in taking this ride from strangers.

While we began unloading my bags from Frank, a tall, shaggy-haired man in a short-sleeved polyester shirt arrived at the museum. He sauntered over, pointed at the three of us, and asked "Which one of you met Todd?" I raised my hand, and he said, "Well, my name's Peter. Now if you want to walk right up that hill there, I live just at the top. You can stay with me tonight. Let's go!"

"Well, thank you so much for the invitation, but these nice people here have a bike rack and they're just going to drive me over to the campsite."

"No, no! I'm just right there, you can get a shower, have your own room with a bed, and I can walk your bike for you!"

At this point, the girl from the couple interjected on my behalf, "No, she can come with us."

I couldn't believe it; three strangers were arguing over who got to take the hitchhiker. I clearly had a preference for who won, and eventually succeeded in politely telling Creepy Dude that I preferred to be reunited with my tour partner, but thank you very much.

The campsite ended up being, finally, actually, only five miles away. Of course, if I had known this, I would not have pulled off to the side of the road and sobbed. I would have rallied and climbed that last short hill, and then enjoyed the massive and unbelievably fun (I'm sure) downhill which followed. But alas, my fear of the unknown, coupled with my exhaustion, and tripled with my frustration at having done "only 60 (Big Sur) miles" broke me. I broke me. I was so worried about total number of miles ahead of me, the total number of miles behind me that I psyched myself out of grinding through one more pedal stroke.

This summer has not been easy. In fact, more shit has happened this summer than in any other five month stretch of my life. And keeps happening. I've had to change flight plans three times in the last three weeks, all attempts to leave this coast and move to DC. This morning, I missed my flight (a first for me) and have been delayed until tomorrow. And I cried, but I also remembered Big Sur, and pulled myself together after only a few minutes. I can't worry myself over what tomorrow will bring, I just have to figure out how to proceed in this instant.

I wrapped him up in the softest blanket we could find. It was the only favorite thing of his left that he could still enjoy. He had stopped eating anything a few days earlier, while I was on a bicycle riding through Big Sur. I had tried popping some popcorn, one of his favorite snacks, but he was either too weak or too sick to eat any. He refused the broth I offered, the fresh tuna, and any of his other favorite treats.

He had lost 5 pounds since I had left him a week and a half earlier. He was coated in fleas, despite two treatments of the expensive flea medication. I was angry at the fleas as they crawled over his nose. They were invading my best friend, making his last days miserable as they fed off of his weak little body. But he no longer seemed to mind them, or at least, he no longer had the energy to mind.

I lifted him up onto the bed so we could snuggle on our last day together. He tried to jump down and his front legs gave out beneath him as his face smashed into the floor. He tried to walk a few steps, but his hip was giving out on him after 15 years, and he stumbled and collapsed. I moved him over to the rug in front of a sunny window, always a favorite spot of his.

Wrapped in his blanket, my friend sped us to the vet. It was an appointment i really didn't mind being late for. He slept on my lap, and let his face fall into my heaving chest as tears fell on his head. I carried him into the vet's office and a man rushed in front of me to the counter. i didn't think such a person should be allowed to have any pets. And then a lady went to the counter and said we could be seen first. She then sat down next to me, my cheeks wet with tears and my lip wet with snot, and asked what was wrong with him. I told her he was old, and could no longer walk, and was nearly blind, almost deaf, and hadn't eaten anything for a while. I didn't tell her how guilty I felt that my move to DC had probably overstressed my little guy, that the multiple moves and an unexpected stay at a pet sitter probably hastened his demise, that I wondered if maybe his little bed's absence through the last two stays had made him felt abandoned...

I will always remember stroking his little body, still wrapped in that soft blue blanket, as the doctor injected poison into him. I was telling him what a good little boy he was, and how much I loved him, and how sweet he was to stay with me for so long. I was looking into his huge brown eyes as the light left them and there was nothing but a furry body left on the table, but not the friend i had had since I was 14 years old.

I will also always remember one of our last walks to the pet store together, a few months ago. I had already paid for his food when I looked down and saw that he had quietly taken a pig's ear from the bin below the counter. He looked up at me with those huge eyes and began wagging his tail. I told him, "But I've already paid, sweetheart. Give it here, babe." I only weakly tried to take the treat away, and saw how happy he was to have it. I dug around in my purse again, paid the $1.79, and he carried that pig's ear all the way home with such pride. it was one of the quickest walks we ever took together. Precedent set, he got a pig's ear with his bag of food almost every time from that day forward.

He liked apple cores and the rind off of my brie. When he was a puppy, I would sit crossed-legged on the floor, cradling him like a baby, while he ate the apple core like it was his bottle.

He was fond of humping. Though he was fixed, he would become excited every time there was a party or a date over to the house. If the guests weren't accepting of his advances (and they usually weren't), he would find a blanket to hump across the length of apartment...looking up every once in a while to pant with satisfaction. I often told my guests, "Don't worry about it. I mean, listen, if you weren dependent upon someone else to masturbate, wouldn't you hope they would help you out?" Once, though, my friend's boyfriend was laying on the floor watching tv when of a sudden, he yelled out, "what the fuck???" Suki was humping his head. i think I might have peed my pants a little from laughing so hard.

When he caught frisbees, the wind would usually catch the frisbee and turn my little Shih Tzu into a kite. He ran into a screen door once, and never trusted patio doors again. In the wintertime in Indiana, he would often get stuck out in the snowy yard, one paw raised in an attempt to warm it. he couldn't bear to put that paw back into the snow to come inside. He could also jump onto pool tables, over the back of couches, and of course, over any child gates we set up during his potty-training phase. In the last months, of course, he needed help getting onto my couch--in any way. He was pretty excited about the sleeping mat arrangement I had during the last weeks of our time at the apartment in San Diego.

We could communite so well. Location+cry type let me know what he wanted, and motion+voice command let him know I wanted. If i wanted onto a chair he was on, I simply said "Down" and he jumped down. Or, I would pat the spot I wanted him to move to, and he would sweetly oblige. if he wanted to go outside and i was in the middle of some task, i would say "in a minute sweetheart," and he would wait up to five minutes before reminding me that he did, in fact, need to pee, and dude, I'm a dog, so let's step to it, shall we? Once outside, of course, when I needed him back, I had to yell "TWEAT!!!" and he would sprint to me. I think he probably couldn't hear that these last few years.

When they began to put the actual poison into him, I fought every desire to wrap him tighter in that blanket and take him home. But i didn't want him to suffer for me; I didn't want him to be hungry any longer and unable to eat, to want to move into the sunshine but unable to walk there. he didn't close his eyes and go to sleep, but he didn't suffer any pain or stress. I wish I could have saved my sobbing for afterward, and just let him see me smiling back at my very good little boy.