Soak Up The Sun

It was a burnt-sienna sun simmering across a cornflower sky today. I know those colors because Steve Bingle sat next to me in the fourth grade and had the 64-color box of Crayola crayons with the built-in sharpener. That's too many choices for a ten-year-old.

I was on the dusty and gray crushed stone surface of the wooded Lehigh Valley Trail heading west towards Mendon on my cyclocross bike when I saw them. From a quarter of a mile out it looked like a bike accident. Two bikes were off the side of the trail. One person lay on their back on a bench, surely with at least one broken femur, another was pacing across the trail no doubt suffering from a massive concussion. After a few seconds the situation was downgraded; it looked like maybe someone had a flat, they fought over the best way to fix it and were now in a cooling off phase.

As I neared I could see her long silver hair dangling over the edge of the wooden bench. A zephyr was teasing it. She was on her back with her knees raised bringing her ankles close to her back side. Her hands were clasped on her stomach. As I slowed I saw a relaxed smile and closed eyes on her 60 year old lined face. A straw hat sat on her chest.

I passed the two cruiser bikes with wide tires as they leaned on their kickstands. Not a piece of carbon on them. I'm guessing they were circa 1965. They had shiny metal fenders, chain guards, hers had a wicker basket and his had a metal thumb-operated bell. Both were, in a tribute to Steve Bingle's crayon largesse: a sun-bleached and age-faded periwinkle.

A small stream of spring runoff from the adjacent hill was bubbling across the path. The old man stopped his pacing momentarily and folded his hands across the small of his back and was studying something intently (as opposed to studying something without intent). Apropos of the former railroad line we were sharing he was donning a blue and white-striped railroad cap.

Not wanting to splash him or ruin his chances of spying on the Lock Ness Monster or some newly discovered species of slug I slowed more.

"On your right sir," I said hoping not to startle him.

He slowly looked up, smiling and had the same wrinkles his riding companion had. They had the scope and scale of having been earned together over the years.

"Oh, thank you," he said.

"I didn't want to splash you sir."

"Go slow or you'll get a rooster tail," he warned with an easy chuckle as I rode off.

It wasn't the first stream crossing of the day and I had plenty of mud on me and I was sporting a magnificent rooster.

Next time I see them I'm going to stop and visit a spell.