Take the positivei

As I sit here on the balcony of a chalet on top of a mountain, looking out over a long African valley then it seems wrong to speak of negativity and regret. My head hurts, I came off at unknown speed, but somewhere north of 50mph, and 20ft later hit hard packed gravel. Great immediate care and subsequent medical attention means my apparent injuries are minimal, a sore neck and head, splinters from the bones in my left thumb and a hairline fracture of my little finger. Plus the aches and pains you might expect when a more mature body hits the pavement hard. I could have been dead. I could have been paralysed. Therefore it seems strange to be regretting the fact I’m not finishing the trip riding my now broken bike. That will cost me the excess on my hire bike, no small sum. That’s a minor regret. I guess the thing that stings is not being good enough at something I wanted to be good at. Maybe it’s time to consider the whole thing. How many near misses makes a statement? What would I be thinking now if I was in a Namibian hospital with injuries that were life changing? Does that mean stopping the madness of motoring along a dirt track at pace with the exhilaration and (paradoxically) peace, that comes with it? Or do you take the opposite path, learn and get better? Find the reactions that mean the inputs that enhanced, rather than resolved, the bike’s momentary instability are reprogrammed. Do we walk away when the thing gets tough or do we find the way to make the the tough things easier? What’s the effort – reward matrix? What’s your purpose? You can live in the safe zone, all will be perfectly good, satisfying even. Yet is that enough? If, in the 13 billion year history of the universe, this is your go, then do you default to safe? I could cruise happily into old age: I could. I won’t, but I could.