RUST Magazine: RUST#33

JB
TIME
We rush too much. We’re encouraged to
consume at a ridiculous pace. Whatever we’re
doing is news now, history tomorrow. No
question, we need to slow down.
Yesterday was a special occasion. The moon was in eclipse, a
‘super blue blood moon’, which sounds interesting. Only we didn’t
see that in the UK – wrong part of the world. Still, it caused me to pause and
just before bed I grabbed a pair of binoculars, went into a freezing back yard –
tripping over the bike trailer, as you do – and gazed up. Some 223,068 miles
overhead was this fantastic orb, lit so bright and so vivid given the crisp winter
air. I could pick out in breathtaking detail craters, basins and somewhere in
the dark areas I knew would be the Sea of Tranquility (such a beautiful name),
where the astronauts first landed. The moon is there all the time, of course, but
how often do we, do I, really look at it, really take notice, and appreciate it?
I’ve been feeling the same mood in my interactions with the motorcycling
world. I want to slow down the rush. I want to study the details in my bike. I
want to look at the places I ride, not just superficially but understanding the
landscape, be it urban or country. The bike helps there. I absolutely despise
the way cars isolate us from the world, we tear along never ending motorways
(freeways) utterly cocooned with no time or consideration for this very
moment. On the bike we’re very much connected – so we should capitalize
on that.
Talking to Jonny Walker and Taddy Blazusiak for their extreme enduro
feature in this issue we got on to the matter of clutch control and feel for a
bike. Both of them suddenly switched into a parallel universe, rapturously
describing how these connections were made between their brain and their
fingers, through their feet, how they felt for the energy in the bike, how they
projected that into traversing the obstacle before them. Taddy mused over the
thousands of miniscule observations and calculations that they subconsciously
make, followed by decisions and reactions, where everything needs to happen
just so, where everything must be second nature. And in that milli-second
before they launch, feet-up, clutch biting, brakes holding, tyres
gripping, rider crouching, eyes searching, it’s all happening, a
universe of connected energies and actions just there in that
micro-moment.
We need to appreciate that. Not by watching slow-mo
phone-videos on Facebook or YouTube, but by taking
the time, watching, thinking, discussing, practicing.
Appreciating.
Ride safe
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