So I spent a lot of time with my
brother last weekend. Carroll lives in
other often enough. We talk on the phone once or twice a week, thanks to
Carroll’s social nature. I tend to forget we even have telephones until they
ring.
Friday, Carroll drove six hours
from Buda to Midland, with his bike, picked me up along with my bike, and we
both traveled another one-and-a-half hours to Hobbs to join our Dad. We got
there just in time for Carroll to tune up Dad’s bike and to eat tuna fish
sandwiches with Mom. On Saturday morning the three of us rode together in the
2010 Roll For The Cure 25K race.
As for our team, our combined ages
were 178.22 (42.10, 54.15, 81.97), but if they had an award for oldest team we
didn’t know about it. My legs were the strongest because I’ve been running on
them for so long, but I only started riding distances again this summer after a
15-year layoff. I am still a little unsteady on wheels.
Carroll is the best bike hander. He
has been riding since his BMX days back in elementary school. He also loves and
follows the sport of cycling better than the rest of us, by a factor 10 or 20.
But of the three of us, Dad had the
most miles on his bike and the most time in the saddle, of all three of us. He
rides almost every day, and he regularly goes out ten miles or more.
Carroll and I almost ended up
racing to the finish line but it didn’t seem prudent to risk crashing in front
of all of Dad’s friends. Carroll would’ve won any last-minute sprint, but I
might’ve taken him had we started to race a mile back. Dad didn’t seem very
interested in racing to the finish line, though, so he wasn’t part of the
position jockeying. I guess he has outgrown the need to finish first.
My Dad is happy any time Carroll
and I do something together. We had nothing in common during the early years –
I was 12-years-old when Carroll was born and I started college the year he
started first grade. I grew up with 60s rock-and-roll, Richard Nixon, the Viet
Nam War, and wore bell-bottomed Levi’s. Carroll grew up with 80s rock inspired
by MTV, Ronald Reagan, and wore zippered parachute pants and Vans. We both
played in our high school pep band, called Taskervitch (named after
School
respective eras.
Through the years the only thing we
had in common was music. I played trombone and loved music, Carroll played
drums and loved music. I have always been a utility player, able to handle my
parts but never a soloist. Carroll has always been a percussion prodigy, and he
is the finest drummer I’ve ever played with. I’ve been playing trombone as a
sideline since I was in Junior High, and Carroll has been earning money playing
drums since he was a teenager.
We really found each other as
friends in our adult years while raising families and trying out various
careers. Carroll works at Performance Bikes in
cycling world. He used to pitch bike ideas at me whenever I complained of sore
knees. He bought a bike for my Dad a few years ago, and helped me pick out a
bike a few months ago when I decided I should ride more often with
I have made a few rides with
put in a couple of 16-mile training rides to get ready for the 25K race, I
rekindled my enjoyment of riding longer distances. I can imagine a day in the
not-too-distant future when I’ll need a road bike built to handle more speed
and mileage.
But the weekend was about riding
with Dad; three amigos riding together for the first time ever. It was a great
day. No one crashed, no one flatted, we finished together under our own power,
we contributed a little bit of money to the American Cancer Society, and we
found another way to enjoy each other as men. It was very good.
In fact, we have never been a
demonstrative family. We love each other, we just don’t say much about it. It
isn’t hard or awkward for me to say, “I love you, Dad,” and I doubt it is hard
for Carroll, either. We just don’t get around to it. Growing up I don’t remember a lot of hugging,
even among grandparents and aunts and uncles. We hug more nowadays, which is the
influence of daughters-in-law.
So riding 25K together was never
about exercise or accomplishment or fund raising. It was saying, “I love you,
you are worth the trouble.” I hope we have many more rides ahead of us.
“I run in the path of Your
commands, for You have set my heart free.” Psalm 119:32
To learn more about
With God:” www.runningwithgodonline.com
Follow
Berry directly: berry@stonefoot.org
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