I write so I feel. I feel so I write.
Not sure where this belongs. Here. There. Nowhere.
Close your eyes. What do you see? Nothing? I don't.
I close my eyes and I can see everything I've ever seen, almost instantly recalled. People. Places. Experiences. With intensity comes...intensity. And so the neurons firing down the pathways of my mind perhaps burn their path deeper, an indelible scoring of memory imprinted through sheer intensity of emotion, experience, impact.
I close my eyes and I can smell. Still. The scent of sun rays on pine. The needles have fallen, some of them, as they have dried out, and sneaky bio breaks over the ditch and under the low branches are much less sneaky. Crackles. Pine. Perhaps the call of a curlew from the moors stretching and folding away behind the edge of the forest. The fire roads have dried too, caked and cracked, the occasional breeze causing dancing dust devils, momentary dervishes before quietening again, particles lifted effortlessly, blasted into my eyes, for foolishly I am not wearing shades again, somehow always hitting their target at least once, before falling to the floor again to lie undisturbed until some other mountain tyre passss this way.
I close my eyes and I can re-ride. Every route. Ever. But it's easiest to recall the most recent, of course, even for me. And so I sit in the dentists chair or in the MRI tube of doom, panic rising, crawling up from my stomach, threatening to choke me, shaking so badly the anaesthetic needle rattles on my teeth, fighting for control, fighting not to find it in the way I used to, fighting the urge to resort to an old but so bad for me friend to cope. I close my eyes and I am gone - gone away from the so loud clanging of the magnets as they rotate on their ceaseless endless routine that I could interior by pressing the panic button but then it would only all have to start again, endless endless endless, trapped and inescapable, fighting panic and the temptation to press the damn button, I close my eyes and I am away. Gravel scattering beneath my back wheel as I drop every last kg of weight down down down, holding the back wheel somehow, stopping the inevitable slide over the side of the trail because I misjudged that corner so badly, didn't scrub my speed, on sighting the trail because I've never ridden it before and truth be told the rush is the why, yanking on the bars, trying not to death grip, trying to let the front of the bike go where it wants to whilst pulling the back end back under me - and succeeding. Somehow succeeding. Remembering the feeling of achievement, the feeling of not being a stupid girl who can't but being a strong girl who can, forearm muscles screaming, shuddering to a halt and shaking with embarrassment and pride. Waiting for the recriminations from behind, knowing there won't be a well done, but will be swearing and not minding because I held it. I held it. Me. All on my own.
I close my eyes and I find myself again. The other girl. The one who isn't scared of pain, who's fearless. Before she knew there was something to be feared. Before all the specialists and the grave faces and the confused faces. Before. Before. I can't go back, can I? Can I go back? Please can I go back to not caring what happens to my meat sack? It isn't important. Trying is important. Achieving is important. Pushing is important. Challenges are important. I don't want to let the fear of the pain take any of that from me. I don't want to back off. I want to pedal faster, harder, further. I want to keep going until I just can't any more and I want that to be because not today, not because of not ever. I'm not done yet, damn you. I'm. Not. Done. Yet. Is it as easy as choosing? There are so many people with conditions and issues and challenges. They win Paralympic medals. They climb mountains. They do amazing things. Why can't I? It's only my mind that's stopping me.
It's only my mind. Yet I know there's no only. Fear and scared and such a little girl. So immature and irresponsible. But someone saw something in me. Someone I loved and respected. I won't let her down. I won't let myself down. So I'll put my big girl pants on (well my matte black 3/4 padded cycling shorts - you don't wear big girl pants with those!), and I'll decide. I'll choose. Choose to be more than a label. Choose to be more than a collection of letters that seem intent on damning me. Choose to buck trends. Choose to break statistics. Choose to fight every stupid cock up my stupid genes have inflicted without my say so, without my choice. If taking back control means pain, well at least I chose it. If I cry it will be because I accepted I would. Because I decided it was worth it. If I fall then it will hurt and I will scream and it will be humiliating and embarrassing. But anyone would scream. It could happen to anyone. I sat next to someone for 90 minutes it did happen to. No one judged him.
So. This is the blog post I should have written. The one that's real. The one that's honest. The one that's viscerally resolutely unapologetically me. Sometimes I imagine there are two invisible katanas on my back because in order to survive pain and pain and pain and pain you have to be a warrior. You have to fight it. You have to build walls and boxes and defences and trenches. You have to be mindful, every single second, mindful of how you place your feet, how you stand, what your cores doing, what your spine is doing, what your neck is doing. Constant checks. Constant balances. Constant trades. It's shit. It's crap. It's not fun. It's what I have to do.
So. Time for some fun. Not recklessly. Never recklessly. I've never been reckless. But it's time to stop watching others break the rules of what's possible and sitting at home admiring them. I don't want to close my eyes to see, any more.
I want my eyes wide open.
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