Isolating Myself from Isolation

“I need to get out of this place, if it’s the last thing I ever do………”.

I sing that line to Roo whenever I have had enough of domestic life, which lately, has been quite often. Friday came around with a beautiful, cool, sunshine morning. I dropped the top on “Matchbox”, and took a three hour tour into the mountains.

But it wasn’t enough.

Covid19 has had us self isolating now since March, and bit by bit, has been taking it’s toll on us. Roo has been coping with it better than I, she being more of a homebody. I however, am not. I needed to regain some sense of normalcy in my life.

I had ridden my motorbike exactly 400 measly miles since March. My reason for not doing so? Fear. Fear of having a wreck and landing in a hospital. Bad time to be in a hospital, I reasoned. Fear of financial ruin. Our business had been forced closed by state order. Fear. No income, and huge medical bills. Fear.

All this time, Roo had been insistent that I go. She couldn’t take me anymore! But she knew how therapeutic riding is for me.

So finally, last week I went. I said “screw it”, and took off on a 100 mile ride in the mountains of North Carolina.

I returned home with a big grin on my face. Roo asked how my ride was.

“Wonderful!” I said. “I was so focused, so very in the moment the whole time. Alone, in my helmet, the rest of the world and all the bullshit going on was ‘out there’. I didn’t realize how much I needed to isolate myself from isolation.”