Helicopter Goose Parents
It was the fourth day biking and 40 miles in, I made it to Albany, where I decided to take a lunch break by the State Capitol building. While sitting on the grass next to an unoccupied bench, I noticed an older couple looking around quizzically; they were trying to find the dome on top of the building. They asked me why I had so much stuff attached to my bike. I explained how I started my journey in Boston a few days ago and was heading to the Pacific Ocean. They told me how they were on a trip in New York and that they were coming from Washington state. This trip felt long already, and Washington felt unbelievably far away. After they finished their vacation, they would hop on a plane back to Washington. While their return trip should take a few short hours, it would take me months to catch up to them. What did I get myself into? Could I really do this for that long?
After I finished devouring my peanut butter and honey open-faced sandwiches, I started to bike towards Schenectady, where I would be staying for the night. From Albany to Buffalo, there was the Erie Canal bike path that would take me across most of the state. It was a relief to escape from the roads with no shoulder and too many inattentive drivers. The cars were replaced by helicopter goose-parents. They hissed and attacked if I so much as looked at their goslings, but their goslings enjoyed hanging out in the center of the narrow bike path.
As I approached Schenectady, a cyclist approached me from behind. He had a fully-loaded bike and was clearly on a long trip like me. I had been biking all day and was starting to get exhausted and dehydrated, but he was talkative. He told me about his previous trips and how he was on his way to South Carolina. I was somehow shocked by the length of his trip, even though my trip was three times as long. He was going fast, and I felt obligated to keep up with him as we biked. We talked and biked for so long that I missed my exit. I was starting to get cranky and dizzy, so I took the next trail opening and headed to my host.
Joan, my host for the night, welcomed me in and gave me some much-needed water. She suggested places for me to eat, and I told her, “I just need as much food as I can get for the least amount of money.” She recommended that I go to the Van Dyke restaurant. I arrived at the restaurant, and no one was wearing a mask except the servers. I sat by the bar to look at the menu. A server with shoulder length blond hair confirmed that the fish and chips were the biggest dish on the menu. It cost $15, which was the budget for a day and a half; a budget that I could only dream of sticking to. I sat by the bar because I was alone, and it felt right. Maybe I would strike up a conversation with the cute server. I could tell her about my epic odyssey to impress her. But who was I kidding, I didn’t even know if I’d make it more than a week on this trip!
Suddenly, the room started to feel stuffy, and my heart started to race. I was in a position I hadn’t been in over a year. This was the first time eating at a restaurant since the COVID pandemic began. My anxiety got the better of me, and I asked if I could move to a table outside. Now I was actually alone, with no bartender or server to talk to.
I lingered over my food and headed back to Joan’s. We talked for an hour about life and how COVID has affected us in the past year. “I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life until after I was 50 and got my master’s in social justice,” she said to me after I told her about my career worries. I had just received a degree in Computer Science but had recently been questioning if that was the path I wanted to follow anymore. Now she was teaching remotely at a college. “Community colleges are the place to work if you want your summers off to go on adventures, you should look into it,” she continued. I just didn’t think teaching college students was the path for me either. I went to bed with some comfort knowing others struggle with their life paths as well. But it didn’t make me feel any less lost.