81 mph

I don't drive especially fast on the highway. I try to stay right around 80 mph. I get really pissed when trucks do this for miles and won't let you pass. Today was a busy day and a whole world away from Birdland, my family and my own bed. I kind of become a "shape shifter" and take on a different mentality when I'm on the road. If I didn't, I would go nuts. I like my job, traveling around, seeing old friends and a lot of the related activities, but home is where my heart is. This may be an incredibly corny confession, but I have passed the time on airplanes and long drives and trying to go to sleep in Super 8s thinking of my family and about laps through the trails, imagining what every jump and turn feels like and looks like from behind the handlebars. Every aspect, from a dead stop, rolling in, the cranks, each jump, landing, turn and coasting out at the end. I know, hokey, but I did it a lot of times this past year. A good friend once gave me some simple advice in regards to getting through a tough situation. He said, "I just think of my family and it's all better". He was right.


Here, a good friend brings the city to the mountains and gets up in them guts with a smith on a rail. That's no bullshit. I know you saw it on another site already but he sent the pic to me as well...