Read Online Going Somewhere: A Bicycle Journey Across America by Brian Benson - Free Book Online
Authors: Brian Benson
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small town, but as soon as I graduated, and without a second thought, I’d left the area. I came back for countless visits, even returned for a few summers to work construction and play in the area lakes and bars with my friends. We visited, all of us, and then, like the tourists, we left. Not for a moment did we consider staying. This was the other half of the small town equation. Glidden and Conover wouldn’t have had to work so hard to get tourists to come if they could only get their young to stay.
“Hey.” Rachel’s hand was on my shoulder. “You ready to ride?”
I snapped out of my daze and looked at her. Now she was pulling on her helmet, squinting into the late-morning sun. In front of me, in this woman and these bikes and the bags that adorned them, was everything I was moving toward. And behind me, Mr. Bear.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
• • •
W e rode north through a sliver of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, a 1.5 million-acre, second-growth preserve planted after loggers failed to preserve the first growth. To either side, pine and maple and fir stretched and stopped as one, as if the entire forest had been trimmed with a giant lawn mower. On our super-map, the Chequamegon appeared as a chunky green polygon, and I’d been looking forward to riding through it, had expected the world to go all mossy and majestic. Life imitating cartography imitating life. But now that we were inside, I found it didn’t really look or feel or smell different from the stretches we’d just ridden through. On the map those areas had simply been the white space between the towns and forests. But this stretch, this Forest, had the same mix of deciduous and evergreen, the same lava-hot pavement, the same scent, that oddly sweet blend of pine needles and animal droppings and decomposing leaves, and gasoline.
“CB!” Rachel yelled. She was behind me, but from the way she said it, I could tell she was smiling. “Wait, no, BFTB!”
I knew this meant something but couldn’t recall what. The day before, we’d begun to develop a code language to communicate essentials out on the road, and I knew CB stood for “car back,” TB for “truck back.” But BFTB? I glanced at the rearview. In the glass I could see Rachel hunkered over the handlebars and, behind her, a wall of twisted metal. As an oddly localized gust rushed up my spine, I remembered.
A big fucking truck blew by, not three feet from my shoulder. It was a double-trailer semi, loaded to the brim with thick slabs of hardwood, and as it passed I couldn’t help but think of the opening scene from
Star Wars
. This semi was the Imperial Star Destroyer, appearing from the periphery and floating, slow and sinister, into full view. As it thundered past, I inhaled its sickly sweet diesel-pine perfume, felt its pulsing heat on my neck, struggled to keep my bike from getting sucked into the lane. In its wake the Destroyer left a yawning vacuum, and I careened toward it, pedaling furiously, riding the current, feeling for a brief, ecstatic moment like I might be capable of flight. And then, just like that, the wind was gone, and with it the semi, disappearing around a bend in the road ahead.
“Holy shit,” I said. “That was incredible!”
Rachel appeared to have other thoughts on the matter, but before she had the chance to respond, my rear wheel cut in.
Ping!
Rachel heard it too. “Was that . . . ?” she asked.
I slid over to the shoulder, got off the bike, and discovered that, yes, it was
that
. Another broken fucking spoke.
This time it was on the nondrive side, meaning I could, in theory, fix it without removing the cassette. I did my best to ignore the rising anxiety and looked up at Rachel. “You might want to get comfortable,” I said, straining to smile.
Her face betrayed a hint of impatience, or maybe doubt, but she shrugged and waddled toward the grass. “I’m going to make a couple of calls, ’kay?”
I nodded and set to
“Hey.” Rachel’s hand was on my shoulder. “You ready to ride?”
I snapped out of my daze and looked at her. Now she was pulling on her helmet, squinting into the late-morning sun. In front of me, in this woman and these bikes and the bags that adorned them, was everything I was moving toward. And behind me, Mr. Bear.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
• • •
W e rode north through a sliver of the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, a 1.5 million-acre, second-growth preserve planted after loggers failed to preserve the first growth. To either side, pine and maple and fir stretched and stopped as one, as if the entire forest had been trimmed with a giant lawn mower. On our super-map, the Chequamegon appeared as a chunky green polygon, and I’d been looking forward to riding through it, had expected the world to go all mossy and majestic. Life imitating cartography imitating life. But now that we were inside, I found it didn’t really look or feel or smell different from the stretches we’d just ridden through. On the map those areas had simply been the white space between the towns and forests. But this stretch, this Forest, had the same mix of deciduous and evergreen, the same lava-hot pavement, the same scent, that oddly sweet blend of pine needles and animal droppings and decomposing leaves, and gasoline.
“CB!” Rachel yelled. She was behind me, but from the way she said it, I could tell she was smiling. “Wait, no, BFTB!”
I knew this meant something but couldn’t recall what. The day before, we’d begun to develop a code language to communicate essentials out on the road, and I knew CB stood for “car back,” TB for “truck back.” But BFTB? I glanced at the rearview. In the glass I could see Rachel hunkered over the handlebars and, behind her, a wall of twisted metal. As an oddly localized gust rushed up my spine, I remembered.
A big fucking truck blew by, not three feet from my shoulder. It was a double-trailer semi, loaded to the brim with thick slabs of hardwood, and as it passed I couldn’t help but think of the opening scene from
Star Wars
. This semi was the Imperial Star Destroyer, appearing from the periphery and floating, slow and sinister, into full view. As it thundered past, I inhaled its sickly sweet diesel-pine perfume, felt its pulsing heat on my neck, struggled to keep my bike from getting sucked into the lane. In its wake the Destroyer left a yawning vacuum, and I careened toward it, pedaling furiously, riding the current, feeling for a brief, ecstatic moment like I might be capable of flight. And then, just like that, the wind was gone, and with it the semi, disappearing around a bend in the road ahead.
“Holy shit,” I said. “That was incredible!”
Rachel appeared to have other thoughts on the matter, but before she had the chance to respond, my rear wheel cut in.
Ping!
Rachel heard it too. “Was that . . . ?” she asked.
I slid over to the shoulder, got off the bike, and discovered that, yes, it was
that
. Another broken fucking spoke.
This time it was on the nondrive side, meaning I could, in theory, fix it without removing the cassette. I did my best to ignore the rising anxiety and looked up at Rachel. “You might want to get comfortable,” I said, straining to smile.
Her face betrayed a hint of impatience, or maybe doubt, but she shrugged and waddled toward the grass. “I’m going to make a couple of calls, ’kay?”
I nodded and set to
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