Life Is So Good

A few weeks back I wrote about periodic communities, and another one of sorts that we are a member of is a group of families that get together every year for a camping trip.  We have been doing this for the past 13 years, and the past 3 or 4 we have been going to Pawtuckaway State Park over Labor Day weekend.  The dads of this group used to all work together, the moms had a play group going for several years, and the children are close in age and more of less grew up together.  We don't see each other as much as we used to, so it's fun to catch up each year and see how everyone is doing.  The size of the group is starting to shrink a bit as kids go off to college, but I have a hunch we'll be doing this for quite a few more years to come.

Since Pawtuckaway is about 15 miles east of Manchester, we decided to go to a church further to the east, in Durham, about 20 miles from the park.   Once again Sarah and I did the jaunt on my brother's tandem.  It's pretty hilly around the park, and we did some good climbing and then enjoyed a long 40+ mph downhill to the flatter area towards the seacoast.  This was the first ride that we had extra familial participation:  Cathy Menard, a member of St. Paul's Concord and the Diocesan Finance Officer met us at St. George's.   It's very cool to see another person in bike garb in the pews in church.

Sarah and I were pushing pretty hard to get to St. George's on time.  We made it with 3 minutes to spare.  I was a sweaty mess, no time to stretch, just get inside, find a bathroom, put on the EBP bike jersey (I don't wear it on the rides anymore because my sweat makes the signatures run), and get in a pew.  I quickly said hello to the Rev. Michael Bradley as I rushed into the church.  He seemed to take it all in stride.  It was a great service.  There was a descant on one of the hymns, so Sarah got to strut her stuff a bit, always a treat.  When she does that, I just stop singing and bask in the beauty of her voice.  Life is so good.  Being in a college town, St. George's does some cool stuff on campus, including hosting undergrad and graduate student groups.  They also have a forum between the 8 and 10 services where they invite professors and other interesting folks from the campus community to speak.  Very cool; I'm going to have to catch one of those sometime.  Michael seems to be the perfect campus ministry guy; I love the energy of a college town.  We talked to a number of people at coffee hour; one person told me that she was inspired by what I was doing.  Inspired.  Wow, I never expected that..  Maybe this thing is going to have some impact after all.

We rode part way back to the park with Cathy and her partner Betsy, cruising along back roads enjoying a sunny warm New Hampshire Sunday afternoon.  We had to climb back up the hill to Nottingham center, payback for the zoom down a few hours earlier.  After a few more up and downs we enjoyed one last downhill back into the park, then a dip in the lake to cool off.  It was a perfect New Hampshire day.  Life is so good.

The stats:

average speed: N/A (we need to get a cyclometer on the tandem)

dist: approx 40 miles

total climb: N/A

average HR: ?  (i forgot to write it down)