Blessed

Today I did a solo bike ride on country roads around a reservoir. You can tell you're in a remote area when you keep coming across deer walking on the road and you have to get their attention in order to get them to bolt. Today I came across deer three different times.

I know the area well enough to ride without maps (I can get lost back there and still find my out). I've got a new bike and have yet to mount a bike computer on it. At the moment it doesn’t seem to really matter how far or how fast I'm going. I'm exploring roads I've never been on and this sometimes leads to unexpectedly long uphills, long downhills and occasionally dirt roads. No big deal - for a while now it's been more interesting not to have a plan and just let things happen as they will.

For most of the year I've been riding with groups. Now I'm occasionally doing some longer rides solo and I'm starting to feel an aggressiveness and assertiveness coming back. Hills are becoming easier to ascend and sometimes even look welcoming. Sometimes I push up over hills, or pedal hard on the flats to the point of breathing heavily. The challenges feel good.

As I rode I considered how fortunate I am - to know so many positive people; to feel supported in so many ways at home and at work; and to feel settled into life again. In everyday situations my intuition seems stronger than ever before. I don't know if it's something that has changed and gotten stronger, if I simply trust it more, or if there's just less chatter in my head than there was a few years ago. I'm definitely more open about myself when meeting new people and I'm certainly more open to new experiences. I find it much easier to simply be in the moment these days.

I tried to explain the feeling to a friend (my choc-aholic buddy) by saying I'd regained the "lucky" feeling I used to have. She looked at me funny as if to question my sanity - how could I consider myself "lucky" after last year. Then she got it and she said, "Oh, you feel blessed". Yep.