Lean Into It: When Bicycling and Life Throw You a Curve Ball

One day maybe a year or so ago — the pandemic has proven that time is a human construct and has lost all meaning — I was talking with my father, who art in another town in Texas. I must have been griping about some problem or another when he just blurted out, “Lean into it.” I was taken aback that he would know this phrase uttered more by hipper millennials. For a moment, I didn’t know what to say. I gathered my wits and said, “What do you mean?” I don’t remember the exact words but they were along the lines of “go with the flow,” or “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em,” possibly an explanation, “just accept that’s how things are and do your best, don’t worry about it.” Good stuff, Dad!

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Moving A Dude’s Abode and Body: A Buddhist View

It was moving day. Again. Or days, rather, because who would I ask to help in these times? As a perpetually underpaid and underemployed renter in high-priced Austin, Texas, when my lease is up, it’s time to move on. And these days have been hot ones, too. On the thermometer it was 93 — tying the record. With high humidity it felt much hotter, 101, which is a lot for early May. The average high is 10 degrees cooler, at 89. I feel both the burns, from sun and in the muscles. But importantly, I still got some stuff moved. And moving my abode and my body as much as I do are worth some rumination.

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