Business Report...The Challenging Twenties

Beginning with 2020 we were presented with some high hurdles. Covid started cranking in March and April, which is usually the Spring Rush period for the bike shop, even May was eerily quiet. Good thing I only ordered 24 new bicycles and 20 new kayaks that February. On June 3, 2020 our local doctor called us into her office to inform us that Lisa's recent Xray and CatScan revealed that she had lung cancer. Several visits to the UC Davis Medical Center later she had her tumor and half of her left lung removed. This began a three and a half year dance with various forms of chemotherapy. At the bicycle shop, supply chain problems began in 2021...we couldn't get product, we scambled to find new bikes. Kayaks, even though made in the USA, were not easily available because the raw polyethylene pellets that Hobie used were sourced out of Asia. Supplied from China and Korea this raw material was subject to new tariffs laid down by the Trump administration which turned off the Asian faucets of material goods. The Summer of '21 saw a blowtorch of forest fires rip through our county, mainly the Dixie Fire... resulting in a seven week mandatory evacuation cutting our season of outdoor recreation sales in exactly half. Nearly a million acres of scorched wasteland replaced our beautiful forest therefore eliminating our incredible playground of bicycling/hiking turf, turning most of the green to ashes. My free-to-the-public maps and trail ideas were made obsolete during this seven week disaster. Visitation numbers have remained at only a fraction of what they were during our first twenty five years of business. We are climbing out of this charcoal-colored hole with a whole new appreciation for the vast new views of the Cascade high country and much quieter cycling roads. 2022 featured a discovery that I had a large tumor in my colon that had to be surgically removed along with a foot of large intestine at the end of that Summer. As of March 13, 2024 we are done with chemotherapies and are feeling like returning to our adventure-filled lives afoot and in the saddle. Locals and "second-homers" seem to be making a special effort to support local small merchants instead of buying everything from Amazon and regional big citys. There is hope and we are learning to survive on less income and insisting on working less hours. Each day is a gift so, go out and play more and worry less.

Not That Much Playtime Left

This realization occurred while watching the solar eclipse (only partial in Northern California). Everyone in North America seemed to be focused on this event. No arguments, no conspiracy theories about it being the Real Thing...the Sun tucked behind the Moon and we were in awe...the networks were all focuused on this indisputable event. As the curtain closed and then, thankfully reopened, people began planning for the next eclipse...August, 22, 2044...best seen in the Northern Tier states. Hey, we have to call our son and arrange a rendezvous. His birthday is August 22...How about Montana? Possibly Chester, Montana. And then, it hit me....twenty years from now I'll be 94 years old! Will I still be able to drive to Chester, Montana? I'm getting older. We need to rendezvous more often. We need to pack in dozens of adventures and do it soon. We pedaled our fully loaded bicycles through Chester, Montana in 1978... the halfway point between Anacortes, Washington and Kalamazoo, Michigan. The people of Chester were incredibly gracious. They gave us the key to the fire dept. showers and the mayor (so he said) bought the groceries that we gathered on the grocery store counter before settling down next to our tent in the city park. "We'll make sure the Friday night teenagers don't bother you when you decide where you want to pitch your tent."

Honesty, Is That So Hard?

I learned all that I need to know in Kindergarten...it's the title of a book I read decades ago. It seemed incredibly simplistic but, I dove into it anyhow. Sharing, being honest and playing by the rules, being kind to one another and cleaning up after yourself...(we call this 'cover your trail'). Robert Fulghum wrote down these simple precepts in the early eighties. These are the first words out of your teacher's mouth when you begin your journey through the education process. If you have been paying attention during these last forty years you'll agree, all is lost. Politicians, lawyers and business executives have led the way down into this behavioral pergatory. We have become a delusional collection of selfish adults. America leads the way here, as I see it...advanced degradation of societal norms. I wish it were a different story...that we took to heart what our kindergarten teacher first laid down as 'rules to live by'. Of course parents were responsible for the first lessons in honesty and caring. I am not really sure where we went wrong. When I was developing in those early years, Presidents Truman and Eisenhauer were universally trusted and looked up to by everyone I knew. I didn't know that many people outside my immediate family but, I'd never heard of disingenuous, deceptive strategies for 'getting ahead'. I was quite naive, as you can see, but I think our entire civilization has gone over the edge. Public name-calling and flat-out lying is everywhere, on every channel of communication...the Internet is the ultimate 'deal with the devil'. I don't think there's any possibilty of climbing out of this hole. All we are left with is being able to trust a few close friends and maintenence of our own personal integrity.

The Awareness Of Carbon Footprint

Somehow forgotten, the concept of lessening my carbon footprint and the behavior adjustments that went with that concept. I have since veered radically off track. I gave up red meat in 1970. I gave up automobile ownership in 1973. These were my large moves toward being kinder to my neighbors and the planet. Twelve years later I returned to automotive addiction when I took on a used car and a used truck. I used them sparingly, we commuted to work and school by bicycle and cross country skis. Somewhere along the way we returned to eating turkey and chicken, but never the red meat. I don't think I ever abstained from dairy however, I knew I was lactose intolerant very early in the game. Cheese and yogurt agree with me and by consuming more than my fair share of these two foods I am encouraging large clouds of bovine methane. The new century witnessed us partaking in next level environmental degradation...jetting across the Atlantic. We were also deep into the internal combustion behaviors...occasional commutes by foot and by bicycle help allay feelings of guilt that might haunt us from the last century...but now, we find it so satifying to gather the camping gear and for remote warmer locations via motorcar, escaping uncomfortable temperatures. It's not like you get credits for previous conscientious behaviors...the warming earth is still in trouble and our neighbors are struggling and dying from the impacts, 'we the privileged' foist upon them.

One Less Worry

As I walk out the door this morning my biggest worry is....Space Junk. It comes back to earth at speeds ten times faster than a bullet. My sister assures me that it mostly burns up on reentry and if a large piece did not burn up and happened to hit me, I would never be inconvenienced with injury anyhow, i would expire suddenly so, why worry? Actually what I am celebrating by expressing that my biggest worry upon starting my day with Space Junk, as my top worry, has resulted from the fact that my sweetest of sweethearts was found to be permanently cancer free and will no longer need her morning chemotherapy pill. CANCER... The enemy of us all has been dealt a lethal blow by careful and conscientious attention to strategies, including surgeries and follow-up treatments...and we have won the battle to keep breathing, laughing, playing hard outside, loving and imbibing in this experience we call LIFE. It was four years ago that a genetic glitch (egfr) was found to have embedded a carcinogenic tumor into the lung of my favorite human on the planet. We have worked hard to follow all the instructions and submitted to all procedures necessary to rid ourselves of this monster. Worrying less is a good thing and I'm thinking if my biggest worry is that the sun may not rise the next day or that I'll be incinerated by space junk then I'm in a pretty good place.

The Number One Thing I Can Do To Save Planet Earth.

I have been looking for the best way to save the big blue ball we call Earth...well, for six decades anyhow. I don't seem to be able to convince others that this is the single 'most important' issue that humanity faces. I haven't really motivated a single person to change any of their behaviors while they live out their appointed session on this planet. My opinion and counsel about Earth rescue does not register with a single soul within shouting distance of me. I am not an "influencer". Doesn't matter how I vote or what I promote. The world continues to roll down this slippery slope toward catastrophic fever and eventual unlivability. So, what am I left with? What can be my greatest contribution to solving this Earths dilemma? Where can I make a difference that will pull humanity and it's ultimate Mother out of this daily tailspin? When I walk down the path from my house (which I built with my own two hands and a couple of good friends) two hundred feet to my garage, which harbours my two gas-powered motor vehicles. I check the temperature and road conditions, deciding to not fire-up either of these dragons, making the all important decision to pedal my acoustic/non-electric bicycle to work...it's all I've got. Seriously, it's the only important decision that I have to make which possibly leads to the world evolving into a more livable environment and to bring down Earth's fever.