I choose the Expresso-brand recumbent biking machine in
front of a large window. Beyond the
parking lot is Highway 10, the main road running east-west through our town. To
handle all the traffic, the road was widened a few years ago and it now has a
left-turn lane for a half mile. Another street
dead-ends perpendicularly to the highway in the view before me, providing the
vanishing point for my real-life setting when my eyes wander above the video
screen of my biking machine.
On the street straight ahead, the flashing lights of a city
police car move slowly forward, distancing itself from my stationary ride. A growing number of cars follow it like ants
going about the work of the day. I track
the line of cars backward to its source in the parking lot of the Lutheran
church. My cadence wanes as the line
lengthens. It is a family going about
the work of their day; the generational work of burying their dead. It’s been over three years since I’ve
journeyed that road. How long until . .
.
The Star Wars theme gathers me back inside. Padme’ was watching my pre-ride stretch and now
the wall-mounted screen in the far corner registers in my ears. The window and the glaring sun warmly buffer
my fake ride from cold reality.
Or is this cold in here and that out there, (warm) reality?
