It’s been two days since Cycle for Survival and the letdown that I was expecting hit me today and it took at least a half hour of Tripper to fetch me out of the doldrums I found myself in this morning. But fetch me he did. He did by just being himself, with his iconic look and the trademark eyes that roll back in his head as he looks for divine intervention. He simply makes me smile and he does it without words. He truly is a sentient being.
Sunday and Monday I was still floating on a high of experiential heaven. I was recalling the feeling of watching a hundred cyclists and three instructors and realized how the electronic feed into my brain is a world apart from when I am in my pedal stroke and able to channel the high voltage and excitement I feel in the saddle. The class is like a cloak when we ride and when we watch it’s like we are naked and helpless just sitting in the dugout waiting our turn. But I loved the perspective it gave me because it allowed me to witness human frailty and just how precious that is. Even the most confident of us are awed in a scenario we can’t comprehend. Humans with the indomitable spirit that live with courage and tenaciousness in the face of death are what make life worth living. That might sound a little hokey but it appears apropos.
Knowing that today I would be headed to the cardiologist for an echo and nuclear stress test, I figured an hour of Svengali would prime my heart pump just perfectly. I thought I was going to blow my doctor away on that treadmill. After all my vital signs I thought were stellar for a sexagenarian. However, as I stepped on the treadmill filled with Captain America nuclear fuel coursing through my veins I went into atrial fibrillation right then and there. I looked at my HR, which is normally 57 resting shot up like a rocket 120,130 and then still higher. I watched my lean cardiologist blink in amazement as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. And even in a-fib as I was you couldn’t tell by my countenance or more importantly my breathing. As I headed into 150 BPM I felt some tremors from within but I was convinced that the 13 months of spinning choreography had me better prepared for this episode than I was in years past. I could see his mind whirring and as he scanned his hard drive he was at a loss for what to recommend. At first blush he said maybe another catheter ablation or maybe the blood thinning coumadin. I intuitively knew that wasn’t going to be his final prescription and as I was walking out, he just said come back in 5 months.
I have to say it again. Most of you know Mary McCann. Perfect physiology in Spartan like shape. She is one of the nicest people I know. Never takes anything for granted and is smiling all the time. I am so happy to think of her as my friend.
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