Sharon's Ride Around The World

I'm trying to wave...really I am...but it's so cold. This is the first day of an adventure I've been planning for years and I can barely manage a grimace--a grimace that's frozen in place--that makes me wonder if my mother is right--and the longer I keep making this face-- the more likely my expression " will stay that way."

I'm among more than 240 cyclists with Odyssey 2000 who are starting their year around the world trek freezing in the Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California. We are in the parade but at this moment I think the cold is keeping a lot of people from caring.

We are an interesting bunch. Very few--if any--are professional atheletes..at least two riders are amputees, some are old enough to have grandchildren and a few probably wish they were in better shape. The average age is in the mid 40�s...but at least one is barely out of his teens. A lot of us have taken leaves of absences, some--like myself--have just flat out quit their jobs.

I know I wanted to do this ride when I realized most of the 1990's started blending from one year to the next. If living is made up of days that matter--I was just surviving. So, here I am grimacing--but I know this day matters.

I'll remember overhearing parade-goers saying with a bit of awe that THESE people are taking a whole year off to go around the world. I get to do something other folks can only dream about. And I know eventually I'll get warm.

We're heading south...toward Mexico. We're riding in no particular order...two, three or four at a time depending on how strong or weak we feel. The early conversation on the road has to do with names, careers we left behind or put on hold. Whether we're married or single or looking to get married on this trip and some wonder out loud if everyone who starts will finish. Everyone I have talked with all agree our lives will change in some way...how exactly?

Postscript: Due to a �Timing error�� we learned our portion of the parade was never on television. Some of us may spend the next year wondering if that wasn�t a harbinger of things to come.

DATE: 1/1/2000

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