Happiness is.....

...not so tough to find if you don't have gigantic expectations. I'm a pretty simple guy. I like birds, animals, snakes, long trails and a few people. I like being able to listen to other's ideas and enjoy the time spent looking in each other's eyes and sharing some human time.

I also like to issue challeges - to me. Often. I don't like disagreements. They rarely end in accord because most people aren't very flexible anymore. I'm able to keep smiling because I understand that just as I'm not going to change their minds, they probably won't change mine. I simply listen, hope to hear a cogent argument being made and usually...OK, frequently...just go on believing that my position is right. I don't understand why it's so difficult to learn to defend a point of view without hurling invectives at each other.

Oh, yeah - I really hate web based disagreements. I guess many feel they are now licensed to say anything to anybody in any foul, disrespectful manner they choose because it's done anonymously and no one will ever know they said it. There is nothing quite so disturbing as the incivility of this "modern" world.

But I digress. Barn owls are flying over the yard, and I can sit in the back and listen to them stake their claims to that air space all night, and always with a sense of wonder. So many magnificent creatures, and so few who appreciate them. Instead, the world has come to a wherewillwegowhatwillwedothisisntfuniwannagohomebecause itsboring kind ofplace. How sad. Life blows past so quickly, in huge chunks if you happen to have any of your time placed on temporary or permanent disability, for example. Survival then sudennly takes on a new spirit, not always a positive one. Our world has become a "me" world, each of us with an entitlement to the life we want. It can get contentious among us, and instead of finding solace in nature, with beings who understand that they are pieces of a larger, impossibly intertwined community, we take by force, practice cruelty, destroying the very people and places with whom we should be celebrating each other's lives.

And I'm tired of it. Enough. Humans can be educated, and egocentric, and uncaring. If you see yourself, try this - stop, sit, close your eyes and listen. Turn down the noise we people love to make and there, in the background of all those sounds you may hear a robin, a wren, a woodpecker or hawk - have you noticed them before? Now open your eyes and watch them - there's not a second of wasted time, of finger (wing?) pointing, of anything but nature's urgent push to survive. There's no pretense, and every action has a purpose.

Although I would have a problem completely shutting people out of my life, I grow more respectful of nature each time I can sit and - and learn - from a non - human. So please, turn off the Blackberry. Stop texting. Get out of the house and look around. Put your faith in these beings rather than your electronic doodad. You might just learn a few things. Then, look me in the eye, across the table or on a bench and we'll talk for awhile. 

That Big Yellow Thing In The Sky?

It's been a while. Two weeks ago, as I huddled in my down bag at 9,000 feet in the White Mountains in a snow flurry(on Memorial Day?), I swore off any knowledge of it, finally. Weekend after weekend, run after run (or roll, in my case), long hike after long hike, chipping mud from shoes clothes, wheelchair parts and miscellaneous exposed body bits, its appearence nevertheless surprised me.

I'd given up on summer. There it is, though, on my calendar - taunting me at my desk, begging me to strap on the backpack so it could once more abandon me as I set out on another adventure. But here it was today - the sun, showering warmth that fractured the foggy morning in Silicon Valley. I wanted to get up from my cube, but feared disrupting the moment, maybe setting off rebellion with the Weather Gods. So I just sat, as I always do, and looked out the window.

Checking the forecast for the weekend, however, finally fired me up. No, 12,000 feet will probably hav to wait until September given the snowpack, but local trails will be dry enough to navigate over any possible distance. Maybe a loop from Skyline Gate in Redwood Regional. Perhaps a long slog up the Iron Horse and back, Dublin to Concord, a 40 + mile endeavor. Or maybe I'll find a creek or pond and just roll in - after all, I've gotten so used to wet weekends...why change now?

The best part? Summer, real summer, is just two weeks away. And it looks like summer is going to hang on for a while - maybe September, if there is a Santa Claus. Training is way behind schedule, so I'm going to have to double time my days, making Casey Jones - style rolls all over the western states.

I hope to see you, by the way, this Saturday, June 11 at Quarry Lakes Regional Park in Fremont, where I'll have my Ambassador shoes on as the EBRPD unveils "Healthy Parks, Healthy People". Early next week you can read my full take on the program at ebparks.org/bobcoomber . Best of all, it'll be a nice day. A nice weekend. Nice nights after work to zoom some mileage into the mix. Has anyone ever made the Livermore - San Jose commute in a chair? Probably not...another "first" to seek... :-)

So enjoy this time - full moon on the 15th, Solstice on the 21st, and Livermore's Relay For Life the 25th - 26th. I'm still looking to finish with close to 50 miles under my wheels, and being on the track for as much of the 24 hour event as I can muster. All because it's finally summer, and I'm ready to roll. It's what I do, how I roll. Oh, I'm on a roll now...see you out there, for as long as this summer thing hangs around.