Why?
Because it feels good. Because it makes me feel alive. Because it releases me. Because. Just because. I can’t draw upon the words to describe the feeling, the exhilaration, the focus, the timeshift, the freedom. Words aren’t adequate to describe the “why”.
Adrenaline junky? Maybe. But maybe it’s something different. Travelling up the Reefton Spur at speed and I’m not thinking consciously about the danger: I’m fully focused, present in the now, reacting to the conditions, tempering my throttle hand with cues from the surface, from my vision, from a calculation inside my head. My subconscious determining the speed, the lean angle, the pressure on the bars, my weight distribution, my thighs gripping the tank.
The light dapples through the trees, masking the road surface, making it difficult to see leaf and branch litter, the coolness as I head upwards into the mountains bringing a welcome relief from the soaring temperatures of the land down below, the freshness of the air, the scent of high altitude gum trees permeates, the stillness, the colours and the sound of my engine barely muffled. I’m in time again and also outside time; outside the realm of discernable time, I’m like a bird swooping, skimming along the road surface, through time rather than within time I wend my way to the summit of Lake Mountain. Deserted roads, cooling air massage my leathers, the ever present smears on my visor.
I love this time, this feeling, this being.
I am a rider, I ride.