We continued around the circular drive, first toward the shore, then alongside it, and then away, retracing our path. In that brief moment, when we paralleled the shore, I felt like I had turned straight into a giant’s fan. I pedaled, but barely moved. Fortunately we only had a moment traveling in that direction before we rounded the curve and headed back toward the park’s entrance. Now the blasts struck us from our right side, shoving us toward the center of the road. “I’m glad there’s nobody else out here,” I thought to myself. “Then again, what the heck are we doing out here?”
Around that time, another thought struck me, perhaps a bit more gently or slowly than the gale winds. It dawned on me that after we re-crossed the highway overpass, treacherous as that might be, our next stretch would be even more challenging. We would have to turn right. For the remainder of our trip, we would pedal straight into the wind, straight into the storm.
“Hold on tight!” I shouted to Emma as we approached the overpass. To our right we looked out over the huge alley-like opening. Over the guard rail, I could see the cars on I-95, whizzing past in both directions. I struggled to keep my bike on a straight course. With no trees to form a windbreak, we took a huge blast on our right sides.
Finally over the top, we headed down the hill toward the farm where we’d turn off. I didn’t want to alarm Emma, but I felt a growing nervousness about what lay ahead. I felt like I should at least prepare her for the rougher ride we were about to face. “Find an easy gear, Em, we may be heading right into the wind.”
“I was already thinking of that,” she said. We turned right, and sure enough, my bike nearly came to a dead stop. I hunched down, my chin nearly on my handlebars, so I didn’t block too much wind. I switched to an easier gear. I could pedal, but it felt like I was going nowhere.
As we plodded up the hill alongside the farm, the wind seemed determined to throw us back. The rain pelted us. As I watched Emma struggling to keep her legs pumping, I felt guilt slapping my face, too. What had I been thinking? You don’t try to squeeze a bike ride in when a huge storm is bearing down on you. What kind of a father takes his daughter out for a ride in a hurricane?
I thought about going in front. Maybe I could shield Emma from some of the wind. But what if she fell behind? What if I didn’t hear her? Imagine showing up at home without Emma. “Uhh, she was behind me a second ago…” I decided to stay in back.
Still plodding into the wind, we crossed over the highway again. As we rolled down the steep incline toward Burying Hill, I didn’t have to worry about picking up too much speed. The wind was like an extra set of brakes. Now I could see why we got so much speed when we were going in the other direction. We didn’t realize we had a giant fan pushing us along. It was on our team then. Now, it had become the enemy. I didn’t realize yet that the enemy had one mighty ambush still waiting for us up the road.
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