Enter, bike

I'm not sure who will be reading this Saturday night -- I rarely have a chance to sit down and write, so I take whatever free moments I can get -- but I wanted to put something out for the record, before I fall into sleep.

Today I rode 50 miles on my bike, the furthest yet this spring. One of my earliest posts on this blog was about cycling, and the sport continues to be one of the greatest sources of joy in my life. In that blog, I said that I would use a later post to write about how I got my bike; I don't believe that I ever followed through on that promise, so here it goes.

I got my road bike about a year and a half ago, shortly after our wedding. My husband was a cyclist in college, and he wanted me to be able to join him on his rides. Whenever we tried to run together as a couple, he was far faster than I was and the run would end up being frustrating to both of us. A bike, it seemed, could ease the gap between our speeds. With some of the cash gifts that we received for our wedding, we set about finding me a bike.

Our first -- and only -- stop was Trexlertown, Pennsylvania, site of a legendary, semi-annual "swap meet" where cyclists and shop owners converge on the Lehigh Valley Velodrome for a day-long bike fair. There, you'll see hundreds of sharp booths run by east-coast bike shops, along with more informal offerings of bike parts and frames scattered here and there across the grass. Chuan was ruthless in his pursuit of my bike. We stuck to our strategy of "bike first, gear second," and raced around from seller to seller looking for a fast road bike in our price range. We ended up buying my bike, a 2006 Fuji Roubaix RC, from a youth "development team" that had been sponsored by Fuji the year before and was selling their old bikes to make way for the new set that they would receive.

After I got my bike, the rest of the swap meet passed by in a frenzy. Chuan and I ran around looking to "gear me up," that is, to get me properly equipped to actually ride the bike. We bought a helmet, bike shorts, a jersey and a jacket, cycling gloves, a computer to track my speed and pace, water bottle racks, and a "trainer" so that I could ride my bike indoors in the winter. I knew next to nothing about bikes, other than that I had always known how to ride one, and I was amazed at the enthusiasm of the other cyclists that day, whether they were buying or selling equipment. I felt like I was gaining entry into a community, the community of serious cyclists. Strange people they were, and yet I liked this feeling of entering a sport, of being on the cusp of something new in my life.

We bought the bike in October of 2007; four cold months followed before I started to ride my bike outdoors. Last spring I taught myself the basics of road cycling, riding early in the mornings and occasionally on the weekends with Chuan. This year I want to go deeper with my riding, and I have joined the New York Cycling Club. On a whim, I decided to do their A Classic training group, meaning that every Saturday for the next three months you will find me on my bike in some remote New Jersey, Connecticut, or Westchester County roads. Today it was 50 miles around the New Jersey suburbs; next week it will be a longer ride to White Plains, New York, until we eventually work our way up to a "Century" -- a hundred mile ride!

It is especially meaningful to me to be able to join a new sport at this point in my life, after having recovered from an eating disorder several years ago. Looking back, I could never have done this sport when I was actively bulimic -- or any other sport for that matter. Honestly, I would not have been strong enough, and my obsession with food and exercise would probably have hindered, not helped, any training efforts. It is very rewarding to see that now, having changed so many of my behaviors towards food and exercise, I am at last able to participate in a sport for its own sake. What freedom!

As Susan B. Anthony said:

I'll tell you what I think of bicycling. I think it has done more to emancipate women than any one thing in the world. I rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a bike. It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammelled womanhood.

Good-bye lunch

My sister came to visit us here in New York this weekend. She lives in San Francisco now, so my chances to spend time with her are far and few between. On Friday we went to Soho looking for a spare part for my bike, and then we wandered around Little Italy and Chinatown, searching for ingredients for a big meal we had planned for last night. I love walking around New York with a destination; I have lived here long enough that simply wandering the city just doesn't excite me like it used to, and I'm too American to be a flâneur -- I like to know where I'm going and what I'm going to do when I get there. It began to rain late in our tour, but it was a warm day, and the rain just added to the special-ness of the occasion: a day just to be with my sister, here in the city that I call home, doing nothing extraordinary but enjoying every moment of the intimacy of the streets.

My sister and I don't always get along. I know that most siblings are like that, but with us there have been some particularly bad months over the last few years. We are trying to make things better, even though we live so far apart. I think it's a good sign that, after she left this afternoon, I felt lonely without her.

This morning we both woke up early and visited the nearby farmers market, picking out sweet potatoes and parsnips, arugula and milk, bacon and cheese. It was delightful to walk around one more time with her, this person who looks so much like me, this person who knows so much about me, more even than I could tell you. I took particular pride in showing her our neighborhood and our city; maybe, someday, she'll decide to leave California and make her way to this coast.

We spent the rest of the morning much as we did growing up, each one working on her own project (she was finishing an article for work; I was starting a take-on exam). From time to time we called out to each other, commented on this or that, and then she went to have coffee with a friend, and I made us lunch.

I often make lunch on the weekends, for Chuan and me, but he was away with other friends this morning, and this lunch was for my sister. She has started to cook for herself, too, now that she has graduated from college and is living on her own. Every meal that we have together is sprinkled with questions and comments to one another about the recipe, the ingredients, how we did or that or what we might do better in the future. This time, she wanted to know how I make beans. I love making beans, and already on this trip she had tried one version of mine (large white beans, Italian-style, with lots and lots of olive oil and black pepper). For lunch I made a quick-cooking dal, flavored with hot curry, red pepper, asafoetida, and cumin seeds. We had carrot risotto left over from last night's Italian feast, and the salad was arugula and apples from the farmers market. Blackberries and honey formed a simple dessert.

I find it easy to cook for the people that I love. I only wish that I could do it more often, that my family were not spread across this country, shore to shore. In the scant hours before she left, I felt myself grasping at the time remaining, wishing that my sister could stay just a while longer. Afterwards, I sat at the same table where we had just eaten, and tried to focus on my exam. I couldn't. I felt sad and I just needed to feel sad for a few minutes. Listening to Bach's keyboard concertos helped, as did my bike ride later this afternoon, but I still feel lonely. And that's how I should feel, I tell myself -- there's nothing wrong with these feelings, but like all uncomfortable feelings, they are disconcerting. But rather than push them aside, let me admit that I said good-bye to someone today, and it hurt. I love her, I miss her, and I said good-bye.

Fueling up

Lately, I have been thinking of food in a very elemental way; perhaps in the most elemental of ways -- as fuel. I recently joined an amateur cycling club here in New York, and I am now spending a few mornings a week riding my bike with other enthusiasts in Central Park and further afield. These rides aren't your ordinary commuter trips; this morning, for example, I rode 21 miles starting at 7am, and was back at home, showered, and out the door by 8:45. On Saturday I plan to ride 50 miles, and that's just the first of this year's longer rides. Eventually I'll work my way up to a Century -- that's 100 miles! I am putting in some serious miles on my bike, and my appetite can feel the difference. Today, for instance, I ate two breakfasts: a quick meal of toast with pecan butter and a banana before the ride, and a second breakfast afterwards, of granola and blueberries (above). Even with those two meals, I was still hungry before lunchtime, and have had to remind myself all day that it's OK for me to eat a little more.

The first time I went on a long bike ride, early last spring, something happened to me that happens to most cyclists at least once: I "bonked," meaning that I ran out of energy (for us, that means calories!) before the end of the ride. The cause was simple: I didn't eat enough as I rode. For a three-hour ride, I need to eat at least 150/200 calories per hour simply to keep going on my bike. And that's assuming that I'll have a big meal afterwards to make up for rest of the calories lost during the ride. I still forget sometimes that I really do need an awful lot of food to keep my body and my bike going, but I have been a quick study where this is concerned, because the signs of bonking are so obvious. Without my energy drink and my sports bar, and a constant flow of water, my legs turn mushy, my vision blurs, and my breathing becomes ragged. While I can make a shorter ride without any re-fueling, for a longer ride such snacks are indispensable.

Eating to ride, and not exercising to eat, is a new mode of operation for me. It's amazing to me that I can eat, after a long ride, in a way that is almost instinctual, so far from the over-thought appetites of my eating disorder. I eat because I am hungry. I eat because my legs are tired. I eat to ride again. I eat and eat and eat and eat -- and don't worry about it! I just eat because my body is telling me to eat. And what could be simpler, and further from disorder, than that?

Basics

Tonight we are preparing a real feast for friends, so lunch was simple: red lentil soup and carrot and raisin slaw.

The soup was Madhur Jaffrey's invention, but carrot slaws have become my winter lunch staple, and the recipe is all mine:

Carrot and raisin slaw

Ingredients:

• 1 large carrot, grated
• 2 shallots, diced, or 1/4 of a sweet onion, also diced
• 1/4 c. yellow raisin
• 1/4 - 1/2 c. pecans or pumpkin seeds
• salt to taste
• freshly ground black pepper to taste
• 1 T. honey
• 2 T. mayonnaise
• 1 T. white wine vinegar (or other light-colored vinegar)
  
• 1/4 c. olive oil
  

Mix the first six ingredients in a serving bowl. For the dressing, combine the honey, mayonnaise, vinegar, and oil and mix until smooth. Dress the salad 10 to 30 minutes before serving.

Slow quick quick slow

Several years ago, when I was riding strong in my recovery from an eating disorder, changes seemed to happen so quickly in my life. I felt myself opening up in new and wonderful ways: my relationships with my parents improved; I met the man who is now my husband; I stopped following goals that were set by others; I found a new spiritual path; and I no longer turned to food and exercise as the exclusive sources of comfort in my life.

Around that time, in December of 2004, I got my first tattoo, of a blue heron. There are many herons on the lakes of Minnesota, where I grew up, and I at once associated the bird with my faraway home and with the changes that I had recently undergone. In some cultures, the heron, like the phoenix, is a symbol of resurrection and transformation. In Egypt, for example, the heron-like Bennu bird called the world into creation at the beginning of time. For these reasons, the heron seemed like an appropriate animal to carry with me always, to mark on my body as a reminder of what I had gone through, and of the new life that I was embarking on after my eating disorder.

Sometimes, I look back on those early days of recovery with a feeling of nostalgia. Sure, I was still binging, still exercising off the calories in ridiculously long runs -- but change was brewing. I could feel it. Later, even my body changed, losing the ability to digest the foods that I had once craved and consumed in abundance. There were clear markers to let me know that things were different, and I felt, in many ways, reborn.

The struggle of recovery now, four years down the line, is that it doesn't always feel so extraordinary. In fact, I rarely have the blissful, life-rocking moments of insight that seemed so frequent as I learned new ways to pattern my relationships and new ways of being with my body. Now, those skills are a part of me, no longer new and shiny and revelatory. Life doesn't seem nearly as overwhelming and tragic as it did during my eating disorder, but nor does it often reach the heights of emotion that I felt during my recovery. I know that I haven't stopped growing, haven't stopped learning from my day-to-day life, but the changes are more subtle, less frequently noticed by others or myself.

This is what life after an eating disorder and after recovery from an eating disorder feels like to me: pretty ordinary. While I still have problems (who doesn't?), more and more they resemble the normal concerns that everyone has, like how to get along with others and find my own path in life. My sorrows don't feel like tragedies anymore, my joys are deeper, and the emotional fireworks are fewer. These days, it is just me and my ordinary mind.