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G2R2?
Dark and early, I arrived an the Franklin County Fairgrounds in Greenfield Saturday morning to help out for a few hours before my friend Peter arrived from Connecticut and I joined him, and Sam, for the 90k, no the 100k, no, actually, the 90k loop. Sound like there's a bit to unpack there? Yup, and the ride had barely started.
First, Greenfield, the new start location, doesn't start with the letter D, so I'm asking, to avoid false advertising, will the ride have to give up the name Deerfield Dirt Road Randonee? Yes, I really like Greenfield, but I'd hate to think of this ride jumping on the marketing bandwagon and changing to "gravel". I might have to insist they trade one of the wonderful dirt roads for at least one section of riding the true gravel alongside railroad tracks. Well, the section from Bardwell's Ferry to Shelburne Falls isn't completely awful.
After my two and a half hour morning duty of helping a regular fairgrounds volunteer wave people past the first entry, and also listening that volunteer, who was quite pleasant in person, complain about other volunteers, drivers, ride attendees not following directions (before they were actually given), the Greenfield police, the fairgrounds neighbors, and I'm sure at least a handful of other things that I managed to block, I headed into the fairgrounds myself to see if I could find something milk-like to make up for what I forgot to bring, and eat my cereal.
Back at the volunteer registration, I was soon interrupted by the voice of ride originator, Sandy Whittlesey, who was a graduate student at UMass during my undergraduate studies, and had become one of my favorite companions for somewhat long, and tremendously goofy, rides with great conversations. He even featured in a short story I wrote for a class the fall of my senior year. I could say lots more about Sandman, but I'll just saying no description would suffice and leave it at that.
After my light breakfast, and a second light breakfast (Sandy had pointed me to much, much more than milk), I headed out to the intersection of Wisdom Way and Petty Plain Road, and yes, I picked those names for a meeting spot with Peter not just because they were adjacent to the fair. I'll have to start paying more attention to road names in Greenfield with gems like that, although they still pale in comparison to my favorites: Skunk Misery Road in Haddam, Connecticut, and Skunk's Misery Road in the Catskills!
Peter is also a favorite ride buddy, whom I sort of met through Sandy. While I was a student, and living at my dad's during the summers, there was a weekly evening mountain bike ride from his house. One week, as the group was gathering, someone named Peter stopped while riding past on a road bike and said hello to the assembled mass of people on some sort of bike. Somehow it came out that he also knew Sandy, so we started swapping stories, and I was about to share about the helmet an artist friend of Sandy's had adorned in a collage of letters spelling "Sandman" when I paused and asked, "Are you Peter Waite?"
Peter confirmed yes, and I let him know I appreciated his painting of the West Hartford Rose Garden, painted in winter, of course, of which Sandy had shown me his lithograph copy. Peter, to put it mildly, is a GOOD painter, and I'm fortunate to now have my own copy of The Rose Garden hanging on my wall, although Peter pointed out I one-upped Sandy since my copy is a "unique" with an acrylic wash. Peter and I make a fun paring, at least for us. We both appreciate how each other's minds work, and that they are almost polar opposites in their way thinking. He's an artist, and despite the degree in English, my mind definitely thinks in nuts and bolts, and I don't mean that euphemistically. We have fun conversations.
Unfortunately, Peter's gastrointestinal track was not entirely as ease during Saturday's ride, so he was a little less conversant, but on the unrelated plus side, following GPS, our third group member had us turn too early a half mile into the start, thereby joining the 90k ride rather than the 100k, which our plan had reverted to. A few miles later we had the option, with my local knowledge, to rejoin the 100k without retracing our tracks, but after minor debate about who actually had a strong enough opinion to make a choice, we stuck to the 90k, which was new to me!
Bonus for me with the shorter route, after parting ways, hours later, but still just part way through the route, I rode down the hill from Ashfield to join Jake, and Julie, and new family member Nisse's Tomato Party in Whately, and I was only fifteen minutes after the designated 3pm start time, yet still managed to be the unfashionable first arrival. I even arrived with the, perfect from me, gift: a, I think pretty cool, ceramic potential tomato pot I found in a roadside ditch on the ride up the hill from Conway five miles earlier! It even survived the trip back down the hill bungeed to my rear rack atop the padding of the prior night's sleeping gear.
It seems the Tomato Party is now famous, and rightly so. A few days early I was talking to a friend who moved to the northern half of Vermont at least ten years, and even Rosy had heard of it! Good people eating, and rating, various tomato species, a testament to Jake's PhD subject, is a good time. A lot of them are trail runners, who I find consistently are amazingly nice people, but my longest conversation was with a couple I met that evening. The subject? We largely talked about death and burial, but in a wonderfully not dour or dreadful way. People die. It's what we do, but the eventually of that ending needn't reduce our enjoyment and appreciate of the time before. The opposite should be the truth.
Happily, despite leaving a half hour later than I intended (it was an excellent conversation) and needing lights, I finished my ride home without further impact, so to speak, on my life. It was a good day and a good ride, no matter what it's called, and by giving some of my time to help, I felt less than my usual not-at-all-bad for poaching the public roads to join my friends.
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