On Tue, 21 Sep 2004 08:42:13 -0400, "john" <HI.DeleteThis@middle.low> wrote:
>mike, "crap" happens
I think therein lies an extraordinary, and perhaps insufficiently
internalized difference between dirt and tar... Dirt really can be that "I
can fly" moment.. you can let your mind (soul?) go that moment represented
by the helicopter shot in OAS of the Husky wheelying across that big open
field to the Frontiere's music. And the amount you increase your personal
risk for enjoying that moment in that way is negligible if not zero. OTOH,
the tar is a "meteor-rich"environment. The shit that can affect you is not
just what exists in the 3-dimensional "strike zone" that extends down the
trail in front of you. "They" can come out of anywhere... "They" can be
lots of different things.. animal, mineral at least (ask me about the
little fuck that threw a rock at me in Springfield this weekend) or
machine. At night and other times, you operate under the assumption that
the tar you can't see is "ok". You make assumptions about what you know
from a glance at an incompletely lit stretch of tar... that the bright
core under a street light doesn't really create a region of near complete
invisibility to 48 year old eyes. Riders seem to literally default to
operation at a level of intellectual risk management that satisfies some
feel-good bar for keeping their ass safe. But the amount of thought put
into where to put that bar *really* should be set is rarely given much
genuine consideration as doing that, imo, requires understanding things
about the risk that is more than most want to or can do. Intellectually,
you "agree" with the concept that "they" are *trying* to kill you.
Intellectually. But one of the epiphanies for me in this event is there is
an *enormous* and potentially indescribable difference in how you set your
moment to moment in-saddle decion-making between intellectually agreeing
with that concept and fully "getting it"... seeing what can reasonably
occur when you look at the riding environment free of your assumptions
about risk.
And that's your ass.. some, not all, would agree that principle requires
watching out for your impact on others and some of those would include
animals on the list. As I noted, *I* came through the event fine, yet
despite not being nearly an animal hater, I feel bad for what I caused to
occur to another. That is a type of cost to me.. a cost I don't want to
spend again.
The "outcome" surprised me.. I didn't consider that could occur. Yet I
believed, maybe even more than most, that "crap happens". I'm
hyper-screwed up in that when an (I thought) well-formed belief system
gets disrupted so badly, I really can't not get to the bottom of "why?".
Did this happen because this shit just happens? Should I convert to
Lebowski-ism and just say "fuck it" and go download some more porn?
Unfortunately, I have an undefendable attachment to probability,
preparation and outcome. Without getting into the why,
low-probably/high-consequence events are something I give more deference
to than most, and my posting history is very littered with embarrassing
evidence of this:) How I'm wired makes me believe that understanding what
happened and using that to challenge my operating principles will
ultimately benefit me in the long run.. and I don't have a choice anyway
if it affects one of my belief systems I consider to be "well formed".
>if you take riding as a math problem you
>can't let the mind free the body to react intuitively
>muscle memory responses are not done in the head
>they are conditioned to react quicker and without conscious though
>think of it as a RISC computer on steroids. have you tried music
>while riding. it might give you brain something else to do while your
>body takes care of the rest? hum a little tune
I disagree... and agree. This is exactly a math problem. Exactly like
goal-tending is. Forget that gay butterfly Tony Esposito thing everyone
skates now (the point being that copying it was gay and based on flawed
thinking... not that Tony was gay.. he was a genius) and go back to the
other artists like Gilles Gilbert or Bernie Parent or... me. Those
ridiculous yet ultimately effective sequences of maneuvers that are
invoked real time to a dynamic, adaptive, highly motivated and
well-trained threat don't happen because of some thought that says to do
it. It's training... drilling... practice. That is what creates muscle
memory. And practicing the right things only comes from understanding what
you have to practice. You do the same thing in the dirt.. on a trials
bike... on a motocross track. The reason those apparently similar
activities don't appear to call for the same sort of consideration is the
"threats" they present are much much more constrained than the unlimited
meteor scenario on the tar. It's liberating to assume you will frequently
encounter ruts and rocks and logs and sand and cliffs and DJ and...
because you ride like that crap is coming up. On the tar, the assumption
that the path is "ok" and there are no meteors (low-probability events) is
very seductive. The former is a safe assumption, the latter isn't. I'm
babbling... I'll shut up now.
Nice marmot.
El Duderino
>john
--
Mike W.
96 XR400
74 CZ250 Enduro
70 CT70
71 KG 100 (Hodaka-powered)
99 KZ1000P
BRC, AMA, NETRA, NOHVCC, NRA
"Why do they call it Cobra Grass?"<!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->
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