Pedal Power

Wow. What a weekend. I guess I should finish telling you about coming out. My cousin, Roger, lives in Utah but he and his family come out here at least once a year to see all the family. Over the last couple of years we have started to get close and last year I drove out to Utah to spend the week with him. It was my first long distance solo road trip and was a wonderful time. We've helped each other out with issues before, and when he decided to get sober, I was the first one he called. He leans more to the 'liberal' side of things, so I was pretty sure he wouldn't have a problem with me coming out. The night before I had been thinking things over for awhile and decided the next time I talked to him I'd tell him. As fate would have it, the next night I see him on facebook. This isn't something I would really want to talk about over facebook, but I was still to scared to call him. At least there is the chat function so no one else could read it. So I start talking to him and getting caught up. We both just finished our first year of college so there were a lot of first experiences to talk about. After getting all caught up, I wasn't really sure how to start the next conversation, so I straight up asked him if I could trust him. He said I could with anything. At this point I'm trying to decide if I want to go through with it or not, since I hadn't told him anything yet. Finally I figured, what's the worst that will happen? I'll lose him as a friend and we won't talk, but he lives far away so whatever. I told him I had something I wanted to tell him, but I wasn't quite sure how to. Right before I told him my nerves really started acting up, so I ran outside and smoked a cigarette as aggressively as I could. It kind of helped, so I jumped back on the computer and said, "I'm not really sure how to say this, so I'm just going to say it." "Ok." "I am gay." No response... All of a sudden I start freaking out, thinking what the hell have I done?!

After what seemed like an hour, but was about thirty seconds, he just says "really?" "Yup." Again silence. Then, "wow." No shit. He finally recovers from shock and says, "you know that's not a bad thing, right?" Thank god. I figured it would be fine, but now I knew. I told him I did, but was still really freaking out. We continued to talk for about an hour about everything and he finished by saying if I ever need to talk about anything, to call him. I thanked him, and then we both went to bed since it was around 4 in the morning. So I was extremely relieved. I had told someone I knew, and they accepted it without a problem, other than the initial shock. That night I slept the best I have in over a month. It felt like a huge weight was off my shoulders and I woke up with the biggest smile on my face. I felt like I was floating for the rest of the day. It seemed nothing else could bother me.

Friday I met up with the crew again and played some disc, and then went to Josh's for the night and just hung out playing cards again. Got home rather late and crashed right away. I was really beat from the 18 holes earlier.

Saturday we went up to my aunt and uncle's house, again, for my cousin Ryan's sweet sixteenth birthday party. We spent the day outside enjoying the weather and I took the kids out on the lake for a while abusing them on the tube. After dinner we started packing up our stuff and headed out. Got home around 9 pm and I had nothing to do. All my friends were already busy and I didn't want to stay at home all night, So I loaded up the truck and went back to Lynn and Doug's. I would have stayed from earlier, but my parents and I rode up together so we had vehicle issues. Got up there a little after ten and surprised everyone there. I brought up my guitar for something to do and entertained the kids with a bunch of different songs, both covers and originals. Around 1 am I headed off to bed.

Woke up around noon on Sunday and took the kids tubing again. When we got back to the house, I realized I had to get going back to the cities for band practice. I quickly grabbed my stuff and headed off. Got to Wyatt's house right when practice was supposed to start and we proceeded to make noise. Again, a rather productive practice, polishing up the new tracks and even wrote another new one. After about two hours we decided it was too nice out to be inside so we called it quits and went to spend the rest of the day outside.

I got home and met up with my brother. He had just gotten back from New Richmond, WI buying an old Schwinn cruiser bike and a Kangaroo. The Kangaroo is a foot scooter type thing, but instead of pushing with your feet, you bounce up and down like a kangaroo. The back wheel's axle is offset, so when it rolls, the standing platform goes up and down, creating momentum. We loaded them into my truck and went off to Demian's place in Uptown. Hung out there for awhile and had dinner, before we went on a bike ride. Everyone had some sort of cruiser bike, except Demian who has a trike complete with a cedar box on the back to hold the sound system. He has a battery and car stereo in the box, with two 6x9s facing out the front of the box, using the whole box as a speaker box. One of the other guys has a normal road bike, with a 48cc motor attached, so he doesn't have to pedal if he doesn't want to. We left D's at midnight and started biking through the city, blasting music and having a good time. We finally ended up at a beach and hung out there in the moonlight for awhile. After about an hour or two, we got back on the bikes and started to make our way back to D's. We bike around the lakes that are right in Uptown, probably a combined total of 10 miles, just around the lakes. We got back to Demian's and watched a movie. I don't remember what it was called, but it was ok. Erik and everyone else decided to sleep there, so I headed home and went to bed.

Today, I went to the chiro and then for another bike ride. I was just biking around town enjoying the beautiful day. I just got back a little bit ago and am relaxing on my deck. Tonight I'm going to see Korn with my brother and some friends. I'm not really looking forward to it because I'm not a big fan of new Korn, but Erik really wanted to go and he bought me a ticket. Can't really complain about a free show. I just hope I don't die in the pit, since I've been having some pretty bad back pain, probably from the biking.

So that's my weekend. Non-stop excitement. Should be a pretty calm week, with another big group bike ride Thursday night. But I thought last week would be boring too. We'll just have to wait and see.

-Kevin