An Apology

And then seven months passed. Michael Phelps won more gold medals than anyone ever has, the country elected and inaugurated a new president, and I finally entered the working world. But what ever became of Boston to Santa Barbara 2008?

When I first started this blog, I just sort of assumed that I was talking into the wind. I didn't actually expect anyone to read it. It was more for me than anything else. But it turns out you really are out there. Or at least you were. My fellow riders would hound me for updates. I got word the several riders' parents were fans of my blog. One of our hosts even knew my name before I introduced myself because he was a fan. He said I had some really good lines. But however many of you there were, there can be little doubt you are all gone now. Maybe you kept checking back as late as the end of August, hoping that I would publish one last update. But I never did, and for that I am sorry.

The truth is that time became a very precious commodity later in the trip. Wake up before dawn, ride all day, wait for the van, shower, eat, fix bikes, and maybe, just maybe, have a little fun before going to sleep at 9. Blogging just didn't make the cut. But I make no excuses for my shortcomings. A better rider would have figured out how to do all that and update his blog.

I did, however, keep my own personal journal. It is a small, black book bound in faux leather with maybe a hundred lined pages. Black stitching lines the cover, which bears, in elegant script, the word "Journal". I picked it up at the Dollar General in Port Jervis. Everything that happened up to that point in the trip, save what I have included in this blog, is lost to the ages. But everything after that is recorded in painstaking detail. As I flip through the pages of this elegant little tome and recall what it was like to be on the road, it becomes clear to me what I must do.

The world needs to know. The world needs to know what went down on Boston to Santa Barbara 2008. Even if no one is listening I must shout from this mountain top about second lunches and saddle sore, eating challenges and the Death Climb, Roswell and Vegas, flat tires and warm Clif Shot.

So, dear readers, if there are any of you still out there, I promise to go through the pages of this journal of mine in the coming weeks and months and tell the stories of Boston to Santa Barbara 2008.