Post Seventeen

     Well, it's been a while since the last blog. I've had a lot going on, Linguistics class happened, and now I'm working 27 hours a week. I know that isn't a lot all things considered, but it's the most I've ever regularly worked. There isn't as much time for bike riding, or idea having.

      I did find time to write a few poems and 2 short stories. I've thought about posting stuff like that on the blog, but I'm leaning toward just keeping it the way it is. I always hate the poems and fiction I write, that's why I don't do it as much as I should.

The Brandywine River, (my favorite river, and the river most important to me)

    Since the last post I went on my biannual trip to Delaware, although that's almost 2 months ago now. It was a good trip. I love Wilmington, I really do, perhaps more than any other city I've lived in. It's beautiful and diverse, it's full of history. I wish I had more time to explore my old city. Maybe I'll live there again one day. Here's some photos I took around the area:

Maybe not quite in the Wilmington area,but still Newcastle County

Don't have water ice in Kansas

    I went to New Jersey too, to go to the beach at Cape May. When I was very young I went to Cape May a lot because my great-grandmother had a house there. Then she died, and the house was sold. I'd been back since that, but not in the last 6 years. It's a good place.

     So that was my little trip to the east. When I got back to Kansas I had to do my linguistics class and work, that took up most of June. I got a 92% overall in the course, I'm happy about that. 

    Now it's the end of July, the corn is as tall as a man, and we're about to get 4 days straight of temps at or over 100 degrees. This morning (July 24) was my last chance to get in a good bike ride for a while, and I took it.

    It rained until sometime around 10am, and temperatures went down into the 70s. Perfect weather. Before I made breakfast (crunchy raisin bran in whole milk) I went out to the deck to feel some rain and saw a hawk in my neighbors tree. I think it was either a red-tailed or red-shouldered. I'm not the best at IDing hawks. It stared at me a little bit, but didn't seem too concerned. 

     I got out around 10:30 & rode down to the west side of the levee. The levee has got to be one of my favorite places in Lawrence. The gravel road is just so smooth. 

(Okay, for some reason here I started writing in the present tense, got a tiny bit poetic, just having fun)

     The homeless camp has definitely changed things this side of the levee. I think there’s less traffic for sure. It’s easy to understand why. I avoid a pile of trash, and fly past a man lying down on the side of the road. I’ll admit I miss when it wasn’t here, but I think it’s here for a good reason. 

    The nice thing is that after a mile or two there’s no trace of it left, all farms on one side, forest and water on the other. Moving down this road is paradise. It’s smooth, fast, and surrounded by life.

    I slow down once I come to a point where another road crosses the levee road. There’s a telephone pole, and a yellow metal gate. The gate is the kind shaped like a right triangle, with the short side connected to the pivot pole. You've seen them before. Indigo buntings are perched on the telephone wires. Sapphires on a necklace.

    The buntings' brilliant neighbor is the red-headed woodpecker, pecking the top of the telephone pole. It quickly flies once away once I get too close. It’s my first time seeing one. 

     There's some really great views from this part of the road. The wooded hills to the north rise up to end the river valley. A thin, but dense, strip of forest runs along the river, with some trails running through it. I haven't gone to the end of those, but today I find the end of the levee. 

    It comes at the right time too, I'm starting to get hungry. I almost never bring food on bike trips. When I do it’s something like a granola bar. I’m unsure why I eat granola bars. They never seem to have a real effect on how hungry I am. Maybe I expect too much. I say“Why does my stomach feel like it’s ripping itself apart? I ate that granola bar.”

    The levee path terminates at some railroad tracks with a concrete barrier holding two red warning signs. Glittering rubies. One has a pair of glasses and a sticker, the other has a cat face. There are railroad spikes stacked like Lincoln Logs on the barrier, and stuck into the tops of the sign posts. It's a perfect reward.

    When I turn around my scherzo becomes an adagio. Gusts blow hard and fast, my legs complain.  Kansas wants to remind me how strong I am. At least the wind will cool me down.