Thoughts on the Trail

Early morning. A smattering of snow drifts down and coats the landscape with a thin white crust. The river isn’t frozen but I certainly wouldn’t want to swim in it. I feel like I’m gliding as I pedal north, mile after mile, with relative ease. I imagine myself continuing beyond my usual distance, crossing the Missouri border and the Chain of Rocks Bridge, then heading directly east towards whatever lies beyond the Mississippi. That bridge feels like the demarcation between the living and the dead. Across it is the unknown. I pedal over the bridge and I imagine myself pedaling forever. What is my limit?

I eventually turn around and suddenly the wind lashes me (the wind raced north with me, but counters me directly as I return south). The icy precipitation smacks my eyes. I am fully aware in this moment, cognizant of my environs, of the crevices in the trail, of the whitening underbrush to my left, of the glossy Mississippi River beyond that. The river looks like glass at this hour.

I think of my phone. I left it behind. If I were to crash out here, I’d have a long and lonely journey home. If I’m injured, I’ll be fending for myself.

A random thought hits me: I am lucky because still, for the majority of my life, I didn’t own a smartphone. I’m 36 and I acquired one at 22. I imagine my life before smartphones. Life was slower. I had time to create. I had time to invent my own games rather than succumb to someone else’s.

People say I need a smartphone. Do I? Did we need smartphones for the previous 250,000 years or so of human existence?

I read of the rising rates of depression and anxiety, and their parabolic rise upon the advent of the smartphone.

I lack a phone out here, in the cold, under the snowy sky. And I feel pretty good.

Can I toss my phone away?