CULT OF JAMES

Half a mile. Seventeen minutes. August in Pensacola, late afternoon, when the heat isn’t breaking so much as settling in for the evening shift. This is not a workout. This is getting up, going outside, walking to the end of something and back. Thirty-five-minute mile pace, which is the speed of someone who is moving because stillness felt worse. Heart…

July 31st. Twenty-three minutes on the bike going essentially nowhere. A tenth of a mile. Trainer, probably, or just sitting on the thing in the garage trying to convince myself it counted. Heart rate barely broke 110. The kind of session where your body is present but your brain is somewhere else entirely. End of July in Pensacola — the…

Strava logged this as a ride. 0.17 miles in 23 minutes. That’s not a ride. That’s sitting on a bike in one place, or maybe rolling it to the end of the driveway and back while doing something else entirely. The data says what it says: barely moved, heart rate hovering around 107, the kind of numbers that mean “alive…

The carburetor on the mower was gummed up again. Needed carb cleaner. The auto parts store is two and a half miles away. Could have driven. Grabbed the bike instead. Two-forty-eight miles round trip in the July morning before Pensacola turned into a convection oven. Seventeen minutes of pedaling through humidity you could chew. Got the cleaner, stuffed it in…

The mower was acting up — sputtering, flooding, refusing to stay running. Needed carb cleaner. Could’ve driven. Got on the bike instead. Two and a half miles round trip to the auto parts store, July in Pensacola, which means the air is soup and your shirt is a liability by the time you’re halfway there. Seventeen minutes of pedaling through…

Aiden wanted to ride. That’s all the reason you need when you’re seven and the sun’s still up at seven PM in a Pensacola June. A mile and change through the neighborhood. Him leading because he always leads. Me keeping pace because that’s the deal. He talked the whole time — about Minecraft, about the cat, about whether sharks sleep….

Aiden wanted to ride bikes. That’s it. That’s the reason. A mile and change through the neighborhood, him leading because he always leads, me keeping pace because that’s the job. Not training. Not exercise. Just a kid who wanted company on two wheels and an adult who said yes. Lasted nine minutes. Felt like summer. Some rides don’t need a…

First ride of the season. June 2019. Almost a full year since the last one. The bike had been sitting — I don’t know where, a closet, a porch, wherever bikes go when you forget about them for eleven months. Life happens. You stop riding. Then one evening you don’t stop. 0.95 miles. Nine minutes. 10:30 pace, which on a…

Almost 10. The name says it all — 9.88 miles. Twelve hundredths short. Close enough to round up if you’re the kind of person who does that. I’m not. Ghost owned this entire ride. The full Prequelle album, front to back, almost. “Faith” to open, “See the Light” to build, “Miasma” with that saxophone solo carrying me through mile six,…

Almost hit ten. Ended at 9.9 miles, sixty-three minutes on the bike, and Ghost playing the entire time. Ten tracks of Tobias Forge carrying me through the last Florida heat of September. There’s something about Ghost on a long ride — the theatrical builds match the pace changes, the heavy drops land when the legs are burning, and Papa Emeritus…