10/25/2026
81 Miles of Possibility
The Journey to 90 — Stronger Than Yesterday
On January 14, 2026, I arrived home from the hospital with a brand-new left knee.
There I sat, looking at my leg, wrapped in freezer gel packs and elevated somewhere above my eyeballs.
And I wondered.
What was going to be possible this year?
You see, I love cycling. I love the open road, the countryside, the climbs, the descents, the sunrises, and the wonderful mystery of discovering what lies around the next bend or beyond the crest of a distant hill.
But my old knee had become an obstacle to the things I loved.
The pain was significant. My mobility was increasingly limited. And perhaps most importantly, I could no longer do some of the things I wanted to do with my grandchildren. Not fully. Not freely.
That mattered enormously.
So I made the decision to replace my knee.
And now, sitting at home with my leg wrapped up like a frozen Thanksgiving turkey, I began wondering what might come next.
I studied recovery timelines. I considered the rehabilitation process. I thought about what rebuilding my cycling capacity might look like.
Perhaps, if everything went well, I could ride 40 miles sometime in late summer.
Sixty miles?
That seemed unlikely within nine months of surgery.
But I was hopeful.
And more importantly, I was curious.
What might be possible?
I have never particularly enjoyed looking at life through the lens of limitations.
Oh, limitations are real. I certainly had them. They were the very reason I had undergone surgery.
But I have always been more interested in what might exist beyond them.
What happens if I try?
What happens if I learn?
What happens if I change something, remain persistent, and give myself the opportunity to adapt?
What might become possible that isn’t possible today?
So I went to work.
I approached my rehabilitation deliberately. I respected the healing process. I learned what my knee could tolerate, challenged it appropriately, recovered, adapted, and repeated.
Some days the progress was small.
Other days brought wonderful surprises.
But I kept moving forward.
I wasn’t chasing a particular number. I was building capacity.
The vision of returning to the things I loved pulled me forward. The discipline of showing up carried me through.
And somewhere along the way, something remarkable happened.
The extraordinary began becoming ordinary.
By early summer, I had broken through that once-distant 60-mile barrier.
Sixty miles!
I remembered sitting at home in January wondering whether that would even be possible this year.
And now I had done it.
Naturally, another thought appeared.
What about 70?
I didn’t chase it.
I didn’t put a deadline on it.
I simply carried the curiosity with me throughout the summer as I continued riding, learning, strengthening, and expanding my capacity.
What else might be possible?
Then came October 25.
My final long-distance cycling adventure of 2026.
In nine days, I will return to the hospital to receive a new right knee.
And I wanted one more adventure before beginning that next chapter.
The morning greeted me with cool, damp air and patches of fog settling into the low-lying countryside.
Sometimes the rising sun illuminated the road in magnificent golden light.
Other times I rode through misty stretches that looked like something from an eerie pre-Halloween movie.
Both were beautiful.
I love these mornings.
There is something wonderful about being out on a quiet country road while the world is waking up.
The possibilities of a new day seem almost endless.
And on this particular morning, possibility was very much on my mind.
I had designed a route that would take me through familiar countryside in unfamiliar directions.
There was a hill at a T-intersection that had once intimidated me enough to reverse my route and turn the climb into a descent.
Today, I rode up it.
And wondered afterward what I had been so concerned about!
I revisited roads I hadn’t traveled in months, including one that always brings back memories of riding bicycles with my boyhood friends.
I took on B***y Kicker Hill, once a formidable challenge, and enjoyed it like a boy at the carnival.
I climbed long, rolling ascents with a rhythm that felt almost effortless.
I coasted down hills, tucked low against the wind, letting momentum carry me farther than ever before.
When the speed eased, I simply selected the appropriate gear, raised myself back into position, and joined the road again.
There was no urgency.
No battle.
No need to conquer anything.
Just movement.
Rhythm.
And the wonderful sensation of a body doing what I had patiently trained it to do.
I stopped along the way to visit my old friend Mr. Skully, who was still hanging around. I even sat beside him and filmed a conversation.
Yes, I laughed. A lot!
I explored some new roads, revisited familiar ones, and eventually circled through the Florence High School parking lots, something I hadn’t done since last year.
The music was outstanding.
The countryside was beautiful.
And my bicycle and I moved together as though we had become one.
I had set out with a simple intention: ride as efficiently as possible, enjoy the day, and see whether 70 miles might be achievable.
At mile 50, I stopped at my casita to replenish my supplies.
Then I headed back out.
The wind had picked up. There were headwinds, more hills, and plenty of road still ahead.
But I felt wonderful.
My legs were strong. My knees were comfortable. My breathing was rhythmic.
I was not struggling to hold on to the ride.
I was enjoying it.
And the miles kept passing.
Sixty.
Sixty-five.
I stopped to take photographs with my bicycle.
Then climbed back on and resumed riding without even needing to warm my knee back up.
Seventy was getting close.
And something occurred to me.
I wasn’t tired.
I wasn’t hurting.
I wasn’t counting down the miles until I could stop.
I felt fresh.
And suddenly that curiosity returned.
What if?
What if 70 wasn’t today’s destination?
What if there was something more?
What if I could ride 80?
I smiled.
And kept pedaling.
There was no dramatic moment. No heroic surge. No desperate final effort.
Just the steady turning of the pedals and the quiet realization that something I once considered beyond my reach had become possible.
When I finally rolled into my casita, my Garmin told the story.
81.14 miles.
5 hours and 17 minutes of moving time.
3,248 feet of climbing.
And 21,566 pedal strokes.
Twenty-one thousand, five hundred sixty-six.
Every one of them made possible by a left knee that had been replaced just nine months earlier.
And a right knee that, in nine days, will begin its well-earned retirement.
That right knee deserves a special acknowledgment.
While so much of my attention this year was devoted to rehabilitating the left, the right quietly carried its share of the load.
Through the training.
Through the climbs.
Through the long rides.
Through every new adventure.
It kept showing up.
And today, it helped turn a curiosity into reality.
So this final endurance ride of 2026 is dedicated to you, my old friend.
Thank you for carrying me this far.
We’ll take it from here.
But there is something much more important about this story than the mileage.
Eighty-one miles isn’t the point.
The point is that on January 14, I sat looking at a swollen, surgically repaired leg and wondered what might be possible.
I had no idea what the answer would be.
I couldn’t see October from where I sat.
I couldn’t know what my capacity would become.
I could only imagine, decide, act, learn, recover, and continue.
And that’s what I did.
Perhaps your possibility has nothing to do with cycling.
Perhaps it involves your health, your relationships, your career, your family, or something you’ve wanted to do for years but haven’t yet attempted.
Perhaps there is something in your life that seems impossibly far away.
I understand.
I’ve been there.
But I would encourage you to consider something.
What is possible today is not necessarily the limit of what can become possible tomorrow.
Capacity can grow.
Circumstances can change.
Knowledge can expand.
And the person you become through deliberate, persistent action may eventually accomplish things the person you are today can scarcely imagine.
There are no guarantees.
There will be obstacles, setbacks, and days when progress seems invisible.
But possibility doesn’t require certainty.
It begins with curiosity.
A thought.
A question.
What if?
And sometimes that little question becomes a decision.
The decision becomes an action.
The action becomes a habit.
The habit creates change.
And one day, you look back and realize that something you once wondered about has become part of your ordinary life.
I have a saying that means a great deal to me:
“The extraordinary eventually becomes ordinary. But the wonder of doing it never has to disappear.”
Today, I rode 81 miles.
Nine months ago, I wondered whether I could ride 60.
I don’t know everything that lies ahead.
In fact, that’s part of what makes life so exciting.
There are still roads I haven’t traveled.
Still hills I haven’t climbed.
Still bends I haven’t rounded.
And still possibilities I haven’t imagined.
So I will keep exploring.
Keep learning.
Keep adapting.
Keep wondering.
Because at 68 years old, I have absolutely no intention of becoming less curious about life.
And I hope you won’t either.
What is possible?
My friend, I don’t know what your answer will be.
But I encourage you to find out.
It all starts with a thought.
And perhaps the courage to see where that thought might lead.
The Journey to 90
Stronger Than Yesterday.
Straight ahead. No stopping. The Journey continues…
