The song “With a Little Help from My Friends” is a horrible earworm, and I kinda never want to hear it again, even though it expresses one of the great truisms of being a human person on this plant. I’m not mad at Ringo for writing it. It had to be done, just as we all really do get by, nearly every day, with the help of those love us.
I’m just back on the bike after an injury, and it was my friend Fez who agreed to soft pedal with me for an hour the other day, a chance to talk as much as to ride. Fez has had cancer twice, so he knows about comebacks. As we were riding, he said that, initially, when he came back to riding bikes, he thought of it as a solo activity that he could occasionally do with friends, and he was happy with that. Then he started to struggle with motivation, and increasingly he wanted friends to come along. Riding became a social activity he would occasionally do by himself.
I suspect a lot of us have been through the swing of this particular pendulum. Life changes our circumstances. Motivation ebbs and flows.
Right now, I need friends to carry me along. I’m not able to ride fast or hard. That’s what I’m confined to, and so it’s really nice when friends like Fez are down just to do an hour of slow pace with me. I’m not a patient person, and if I’m out there on my own I’ll either grow bored or push myself harder than I ought to. I’m not sure a scenario like this was in Ringo’s mind when he wondered about singing out of tune, but here we are.
The flip scenario is when I’m really fit and motivated. At those times, I sometimes feel like friends are holding me back from the rides I want to do, either in terms of intensity or difficulty, so I tend to ride alone more. My introversion comes to the fore, when I’m feeling good.
Of course, I’m almost never all the way in one camp (social) or the other (solo), and what I said to Fez was that I found it best to lean into whichever phase you’re in at any given time, like don’t question it. Do what you have to do to keep moving.
This week’s TCI Friday wonders what percentage of your rides are solo vs. with other people.
Come on, everyone knows Joe Cocker’s version is better
RE: Joe Cocker – Yes. Agree. However, all the Cocker versions of the song are in excess of 8 minutes. We get it, Joe. We get it.
I’ll always choose a ride with friends because friendship is the most important thing for us all. Even with that I ride alone 1/2 the time anyway because schedules, life….
I would agree that Ringo got more than a little help from his friend Joe Cocker in making the song unforgettable. Having moved around and lived in seven states, not to mention being an introvert who loves being alone, I’ve moved up to 99.9 percent solo, unless you count my dogs. Then it’s about 50-50
In this season of life it’s been 70% solo and 30% with others. The busier I get the more likely I am to squeeze in a ride here and there but the more predictable my life the more I feel free to schedule a ride and double the joy
Actually, this earworm is a McCartney-Lennon composition. And with all due respect to Ringo, Joe Cocker’s version is the one for me. Joe Cocker could’ve sung three random pages from the phone book of your choice and I’d have listened, probably bought the single, maybe the album, if there was one.
As riding goes, I worked from a home office for 30 years on a really weird schedule, so I basically got out when I could (solo) and maybe twice a week with other riders, because I needed the camaraderie.
Now that I’m retired nothing has changed. I still like to ride solo at least four days a week, because then I can do as I please — ride hard, ride easy, veer off the pavement onto some trail for a change of pace, whatever. But one or two days a week I ride with some guys who are mostly older and a little slower than me, and a tad more conservative, too.
It’s a pleasant diversion, helps me forget that I’m not a racer anymore and don’t need to train like one, and gets me out of my little pinko bubble. There are generally three jawboning sessions per ride — at the meetup, under a shade tree at midride, and at a suburban trailhead — so we have plenty of time to solve the world’s problems (you’re welcome).
Oh, yeah: One day a week I do a road ride with my wife. She likes to look for critters en route — bunnies, quail, snakes, etc. — so those rides tend to be really slow. But hey, if you think time passes slowly on a casual ride, just remember how slowly it passes when your honey is pissed at you because you dropped her on a hill while she was distracted by a squirrel. If mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.
I’m retired, so one would think I would want to ride with others in order to have some companionship. But turns out I am even more introverted than ever. So I ride solo unless I run into someone out on the road or trail, and in that case, shoot the breeze for a bit about whatever topic comes up, perhaps ride along with someone for a bit, and then back to just listening to the voices in my head and wondering what the hell happened to the last seventy years.
My wife and I want to get the tandem out again after a couple years layoff. Then it will be rides like Fido Castro describes: -more for the companionship and “hey, look at that flower” than putting in miles. We did that miles stuff back in our younger daze, riding half and three quarter century rides in Honolulu. But even then, the rides were often as not to Zippy’s for chile and mac salad, followed by the ride home. We did have a vibrant tandem social club in Honolulu, something I have not found here. But then tandems are social tools, unlike single bikes.
Get back to 100% soon, Robot!
I’m in Fez’s camp (in more ways than one) Solo activity which I occasionally do with others.
As someone who is in cancer recovery I too am much slower and tired than the earlier version of cyclist me. Today was very tough. I rode an hour and a half with no problem yesterday but trying for 2 hours today broke me. I need to know my limits. Staying on topic, if I would have been riding with others I would have slowed down the group, been encouraged to do more or possibly had someone ride slowly with me and ease the pain with good conversation. Dunno.
For me, mostly solo because life and work dictate when I can ride. But man, I cherish the days when I get to ride with my friends who are either retired or out of state.