Both Sides

10 minutes ago I sat down in front of this blog entry form and began to ponder how best to tell this story. I found coming up with an interesting angle difficult and chose telling it from my point of view instead.

So we were biking. Mountain biking that is. To some the purest form of molten joy, to others a leaden gauntlet of pain, blistered with aggravated obstacles. Depending on the trail I fall in either category.

The three of us were Austin and myself who are, if you'll forgive me a little indulgence, at a solid intermediate skill level, and Blake who was on his second trail ever.

Next comes what happens when stoic resolve is seen to it's logical end point:

First there is 'itsabitch'. A 1 mile technical climb for a total altitude change of 600ft. The climb would be hard fought without the random tree root, fallen limb, or loose gravel peppered throughout. I harbored misgivings about bringing an investigator on this hill as it falls cleanly on the isle of convert doctrine*. Still those misgivings went out the window when Blake huffed it up with nary a problem. Fewer problems, in fact, than I had.

With itsabitch under his belt I trusted any of the uphill the sprawling trail had to offer would be handily conquered by our journeyman.

After itsabitch there exists a sort of mountain biking nexus known as five-way; divining its configuration will be left as an exercise for the reader. We stopped for a much needed breather.

And then we were off! After itstabitch the trails are rollercoaster in altitude and so no long-term huffing is involved. Early on I would look back after a particularly gnarly drop or root to see how Blake was doing. I was meet with a countenance of fierce determination. He flew over a handful of non-trivial obstacles. Several times he yelled "I got over that!", which, though he intimated otherwise later, I took as the sound of a man discovering the wonders of mountain biking. I stopped worrying and began to just enjoy my hobby.

After a while I found myself at point. After a couple of logs there was leafy trail that would not be out of place in Lord of the Rings. The strange oldsmobile that was half buried in leaves would seem out of place, but you could merely fully bury it in leaves and have the appearance of pristine elvish wood again.

I went left. It was the non-uphill fork and I wasn't ready for a climb yet. By that point I had left Blake and Austin behind. After about 100yds I realized there was a fork behind me and so I stopped and whistled to indicate which way I had gone. No response. No rattle of changing gears. No Nothing.

So I turned around and pedaled back to the fork. I stopped again whistled and listened. After a few moments I heard the telltale signs of a biker coming down the right fork. While he was quite friendly he was neither Austin nor Blake and so a disappointment. He told me that he had not passed anyone up the right fork.

We both realized the implication and simultaneously looked down the trail. Like two meerkats sniffing trouble. I felt an odd camaraderie with random biker #1. I sent him on his way and set off down the trail.

There I found Blake on the ground, sitting up, face twisted into a grimace and holding under his thigh. I'm going to say that again so you can take the journey with me: He was /holding under his thigh/. So first thought I had was he opened up some big-ass artery and time was precious little. Though some dissonance floated through my thoughts of turnicates and first aid and ambulance routes. Like a speck on milk, I ignored it at first.

Turned out that dissonance was the question: why is everyone so calm? So before I could leap clumsily to action I paused to ask what was wrong. He could not move his shoulder forward without sharp pain. He was not bleeding to death before my eyes. I relaxed.

Turns out he endo'd** off a root and landed on his head and shoulder. His helmet took a good bit of damage. It was a pretty vicious wipeout.

After a sling was improvised from a shirt Blake had in his pack we had a long walk back to feel terrible and silently fear what Crystal might look like angry. We also spent a good amount of time hypothesizing as to the nature of his injury. All we knew at the time was it was a dull/numbing pain made sharp by movement of his shoulder.

We made it to the car and then to the hospital in Renton with no incident. The admitting nurse was stereotypically jaded and mirthless, the lobby was vomit soaked and uncomfortable. Eventually Austin and I left Blake to Crystal's tender mercies and picked up his car.

His clavicle was cleanly broken. Send him cookies. He is *extreme*.

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*This sentence is a clever allusion to an aspect of Mormon culture. Do not think I just started adding odd words in my sentence. I probably should remove it as I think I have maybe 1 LDS reader but I actually really like how that sentence came out. Also I think most folks can eek out it's meaning from context.

**short for end-over-end. Meaning he flipped his back wheel over his front and flew over his handle bars. It is an unpleasant experience that rarely ends on your feet.