My Ride Home.

I walk out of the back door of Baskin Robbins, boots clomping on the ground and helmet in hand. I say goodbye to my coworkers and walk around to the front of the store, out of the shadows and into the relentless illumination of the Casino Fandago's flashing billboard and parking lot lights. I throw a leg over my bike, put in my earphones, and lower the helmet onto my head.

I click on the ignition, turn the switch to RUN and hit the starter. I can't hear the engine over Switchfoot's "Rebuild (Feat. Relient K)" but I can feel the vibrations of the pistons idling beneath me. My left foot deftly shifts the bike into first gear and I let out the clutch to start my ride home.

As I cruise north on Carson Street, I see a couple ambling down the sidewalk, holding hands. As I drift by them in my traffic lane, I feel an unexpected yearning to do as they are - to stroll down the sidewalk in front of Comma Coffee late on a Wednesday night, enjoying the night and in no hurry. I bet they were having an amazing conversation, those two. A talk about life and death, morality and justice. I notice the fact that this yearning is not a new thing. While working on the fire crew, we would drive through King's Beach frequently on our way to and from the project sites. I would look out the window of the smelly, dim crew carrier and see beautiful young people enjoying the summer sun, swimming and boating in the lake. And despite my general dislike of the "beach scene," I always wanted to join them. I wanted to kick off my heavy boots and smelly work clothes and jump into the lake. Back when I worked at Keva Juice, I had a marvelous view into Ming's Chinese restaurant. I would stand there on nights when I closed, behind the counter, listening to Kelly Clarkson crooning over the radio and see all of the happy people eating delicious fried rice and sweet and sour pork through the front windows of the smoothie shop. And I wanted that. I wanted to be hanging out with friends, not wearing a visor and scrubbing a carrot juicer.

Author Donald Miller in his book "Blue Like Jazz" says this: "Everybody wants to be fancy and new. Nobody wants to be themselves. I mean, maybe people want to be themselves, but they want to be different, with different clothes or shorter hair or less fat. It's a fact. If there was a guy who just liked being himself and didn't want to be anybody else, that guy would be the most different guy in the world and everyone would want to be him." I could really relate to this quote on my ride home tonight. Why did I want to be ambling down the street holding the hand of some pretty girl and talking of life and death? Why didn't I want to be riding a 2003 Triumph Speedmaster on Carson Street? Why did I want to be playing on the beach with beautiful young people? Why didn't I want to be smelly and dirty after a day of hard work? Why did I want to be eating with friends? Why didn't I want to be wearing an apron and visor and closing Jen and Gary's store?

I've been trying really hard lately to want to be myself. To want to be Daniel, to like what I have and have what I like. To be satisfied scooping ice cream and watching the Colbert Report and living in Nevada. I realize that I don't want to idolize myself, to want everyone else to be me or to like me. Yet I think a lot of the time I do what I do in hopes of escaping myself. I want to buy new clothes so I don't look like Daniel. I want to go jogging so I'm more in shape than Daniel. I want to learn to fight so I can beat Daniel up. It's a disconcerting moment when you realize that you are the root of the world's problems. When you admit that so many people are starving while your pantry contains moldy bread that you didn't want to eat. When you see homeless people and come home to a house with a guest bedroom. When you want people to be less self-centered and yet spend your time focusing on yourself and how to become fancy and new.

* * * *

As I leave Carson City, I lay low on my gas tank and hook my boots onto the passenger pegs, hunkering down below the tiny windscreen attached to the front of my bike. I shift into top gear and twist on the throttle, leaving my previous thoughts behind as the speedometer climbs and climbs. I crest the hill and descend into Washoe Valley, keeping an eye out for prowling highway patrol cars. The night air screams through my helmet, trying to drown out John Mark McMillian's "How He Loves." As I glance down at the lighted displays of my bike, I see something has changed. Suddenly I have an altimeter squeezed in next to my tachometer. And a fuel gauge has appeared next to my gas cap. Lighted switches of all shapes and sizes surround me, covering the gas tank and protruding from the handlebars. In fact, I notice I am no longer riding home, but flying low over Washoe Lake, water kicking up high behind me.

This may seem odd at first, but I think that in reality every boy wants to fly jets. It's something that we gain a yearning for at an early age and then slowly smother with cars and girls and Halo 3. Yet it's still there, buried but not extinguished. I don't think I know one guy who would honestly say no to flying a jet. This in mind, I comfort myself by pulling back on the joystick and feeling the aircraft rise higher and higher, leaving the valley far below. I glance out of the cockpit and see lights shimmering beneath me, obscured by the scorching exhaust belching from my vehicle. I pull the jet into a vertical climb, gravity whimpering as it struggles to overcome the force exerted by the powerful jet engines directly behind me.

I see nothing but the stars above me now. I'm so close to them I feel like if I open the cockpit one may hit me in the face. One heavenly body in particular sticks out from the rest. It's bright and big, getting bigger as I speed upward. My eyes strain to make out this unusual object as it increases in size. Soon it is right on top of me and I am able to decipher black markings carved into it's surface:

SPEED LIMIT 50 MPH.

I shoot past the sign and let go of the throttle, bike engine sputtering as the friction of the motor slows my momentum. I sit up straight and swing my legs forward to their proper positions, leaving the passenger pegs wondering what they did wrong. I quickly downshift as the speedometer hits 70 MPH and hear the engine roar louder in frustration at having to work harder to maintain the same speed as before. I know that at this rate I will soon be riding through Pleasant Valley at the comfortable speed of 55 miles per hour. I could probably get away with going faster, but I wonder what the point of that would be. The Colbert Report doesn't start for another 20 minutes, and that leaves me plenty of time to finish my ride home.

Thanks for reading,

-Daniel K