The Oracle of Apollo
Snippets from the life of Apollo Lee

I’m sitting here right now, between jobs, pondering my life, where I’m going, what I’m doing, and what it means. This is a dangerous thing to do when you have nothing to do, you’re limerent over somebody momentarily inaccessible, and you’re down from your usual swagger.

The idea of destiny has come up a lot in my mind lately—not just surrounding the person with whom I’m smitten, but also several other aspects of my life. What am I doing with my life? What am I doing with my career? Why have I been composing music formally for 15 years, but I don’t have any music released yet? Why am I on pause right now?

Introspection is a good thing. Introspection under the cloud of temporary self-doubt leads to overanalysis, which tears up relationships, self-esteem, and the will to march beyond this moment. Time also passes really slowly under such circumstances. That becomes dangerous when interfacing with people who are very busy, for whom time passes too quickly.

I’ve discovered that the best course of action in this situation, when one feels time has a head start and keeps a relentlessly difficult-to-follow pace—while at the same time, trudges slowly on (especially, if you’re impatient, insecure, and waiting for something)—is to get very busy. Invent stuff to do that involves doing something other than sitting there thinking about things.

But, in taking a break from my programming books (I’m brushing some forgotten stuff up today), I’ve come to the following conclusions lately.

1. Insecurity - We’re human. Sometimes, we do things we know we shouldn’t and then we beat ourselves up over it. Maybe we’ve done or said something really stupid that we would retract. This happens to everyone. We aren’t less for it. We’re more for it. After we apologize, we should consider not apologizing over and over again, especially if the apology is directed inwards.
2. Inactivity - No matter where we live, there are things we can do. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and sat around for too long, chatting on the internet, worrying about things, and considering what’s next. It isn’t about what’s next. It’s about what’s right now. On the spur of the moment, I decided to go on a road trip yesterday and ended up climbing up and around High Peaks Trail at Pinnacles National Monument. I had no idea I was going there until I saw the sign on the road. We don’t all have access to magnificent natural wonders like this. But, we have access to ourselves. Go for a walk, a bike ride, a paddle, a run. Scream, sing, cry, get it all out. Go. Now.
3. Indecision - This one’s tough. Sometimes, we’re thinking someone or something is really great, but we’re not sure. We don’t want to get hurt. We don’t want to rush into anything. We might be wrong. And we can be wishy washy about things, great and small. But, sometimes, we just have to run headlong at full bore into the wall. Sometimes, we just have to push all of our chips into the middle of the table and say "I’m all in." It might hurt like hell if it fails, but imagine the sweetness when it doesn’t.
4. Love - Accept it. Just accept it, when it’s given. And don’t stress about absence or worry about not receiving constant reminders. Just accept that when someone says they’re in, they’re in, until they explicitly say they’re not. With too much time and a tiny pinch of insecurity, it can get easy to be overanalytical, oversensitive, and clingy. And we’re not really that kind of people, are we? We’re strong, solid, independent, fantastic, awesome, sometimes vulnerable, but magnificent. In Panic (2000), Neve Campbell’s character said something in a deleted scene that stuck with me, "I believe in destiny. Either someone loves you, or they don’t. If they don’t, there’s nothing you can do about it anyway." Okay? Breathe. Relax. It’s going to be fine.
5. Time - We have control over this unlike anything else. It’s the only resource we have that we can’t get back. We can squander all of our money, but we can always earn more. But, we will never get our time back. Every moment is an opportunity. Every moment with friends, loves, and family is a gift. We waste too much of our time concentrating on trivial things sometimes. We don’t tell people we love them, until it’s too late. We take vacation pay at the end of the year, instead of taking the vacation days. We sit in cubicles and dream about going somewhere away and years roll by while the passport in the desk expires.

So, I’m pondering these lessons and reminding myself of more lessons.

And now, I want to speak to you, whoever you are, wherever you’re reading this, whatever your pain or sorrow or joy or transcendence. I probably don’t know you, but I know this.

You are beautiful. You are magnificent. You inspire awe. You’re worth the greatest joy you can imagine. You may cry, get pissed off, vent, yell, scream, stink, sweat, pick your nose, get horny at inappropriate times, have weird tastes, smoke, eat meat, whatever. You’re still an awe-inspiring being. And every moment that you share with another person is the gift of you both. Remember to relax and breathe and stay out of your head if you don’t have anything to do.

Otherwise, you end up writing litanies like this. Heh. Oh, for sad, for sad.

So, today, I decided to get out of my house and take a road trip. The original itinerary was as follows: Half Moon Bay, Pigeon Point, Santa Cruz, Watsonville, San Juan Bautista, Hollister, Gilroy, Morgan Hill, Los Gatos, Saratoga, and home to Sunnyvale.

After a short IM conversation with Eric Rice, I decided to reverse my itinerary. So, I headed out and made a bee-line to Morgan Hill to hang out for a little while. After we hung out for a few hours, it was time for me to hit the road. As I rolled through Gilroy on the way out to Hollister, I saw a sign that said pointed out the distance to Pinnacles National Monument. I’ve never been to Pinnacles before. I decided to go check it out. It’s only about 30 miles past Hollister. I’m looking to get out of the house and see new stuff today. So, here we go.

I got to the parking lot at Peaks View on Chalone Creek, read the signs, took pictures of the far away Pinnacles and pondered what I was going to do. I decided that I didn’t come all this way for nothing, so I might as well at least drive up the road to visit the Visitors Center.

On arriving at the Visitors Center and looking around, I saw the trailhead to Condor Gulch Trail. So, I got an empty 24 oz Dr. Pepper bottle out of the car, decided to see if I could get some good shots with my camera at the top of the trail. It was only 1.7 miles, after all. I met up with a backpacker from Fremont who happened to be out there at the same time and we just started chatting and climbing. I had no concept when I left my house this morning that I was going to follow trails all the way around the great Pinnacles. My new buddy convinced me to continue to the top when I mentioned I’d planned to turn around and head back. “You might as well keep going,” he urged.

The hike involved a couple thousand feet of elevation gain, some of the most magnificent scenery in the West, and about five miles of walking, climbing, and staring in awe. There weren’t very many other hikers out there today—four women out for a climb and a couple from England. It wasn’t too hot, not too cold, and just what the doctor ordered.

Want to take a look? My flickr pool.

One year ago today, I broke my face on the last metric century I attempted. Today, at Hollenbeck & Torrington in Sunnyvale, I crossed my 18,000th mile. I’m still trying to figure out how much more I want to ride. I have no goal this year. I’m really not feeling it that much this year.

Trying to muster my mileage again, after long periods of distraction and no desire to ride. Today, I thought I was in line to getting my 18,000th mile this week. The ride was mostly uneventful, all pathetically slow fifteen miles of it. Well, that is until my left cleat failed to hold my foot as I jumped into the pedals and hammered away from the red light at Hollenbeck Avenue in Sunnyvale. I listed right and landed on the asphalt.

I’m not badly hurt. My ribs are sore, I’ve scraped some skin off my elbow, and I have a welt and a bruise on my right hip. It sucks to walk, move around, or lean on my elbow. Nothing’s broken. I’m okay.

Except I don’t really want to ride anymore. I just got my touring bike back the other day and nothing really motivates me to get on either bike. And now, I get to spend more money getting the derailleur and brake lever straightened back out on the 2100. I think it’s time to reevaluate why I’m doing it and pick a sport that’s less likely to involve me ending up dead.

Yeah, Sunday marks one year since the big crash. I still have crash dreams sometimes. Maybe it’s time to start swimming or flatwater kayaking or just running around that quarter mile track at Sunnyvale Middle School.

50 weeks ago today, I landed on my face in Menlo Park. A few days ago, I got a call from Bicycle Outfitter to let me know that the repairs on the bike I crashed, my beautiful Trek 520. It’s taken them a while. First, they had a shipping issue with the distributor of the Mavic A719 front rim. Then, there was an issue with getting the Bontrager Hard Case touring tire. But, the bicycle is finished, it’s beautiful, and I am so happy.

Putting the 520 in my bike room to sit next to her little sister, Trek 2100, I felt like a long chapter in my life had come full circle. The last time this bicycle sat in this room I took her out, aired up the tires, stuck some Clif Shots in the trunk bag, and headed out on my Saturday metric century. That was 350 days ago.

Welcome home, my wine-colored baby. You’ve been missed.