Earlier in the week, I was scheduled for a tough interval workout. For whatever reason (mostly leftover fatigue- both mental and physical), I decided to blow off the intervals and hit the trail for a mountain bike ride.

There was a deluge of rain approaching on the radar, and, even though it wasn’t very close to my area yet, the air was heavy, and small drops were spitting from the clouds within the first few minutes of my ride. When I passed the trailhead, the parking lot was empty. On the trail, the rain had not yet breached the tree cover, so the ground was dry.

The trail is a pretty popular spot for morning  joggers and the occasional mountain bike rider, but today, I was alone. The sound of the rain on the trees over my head and the solitude of being the only person in the woods was absolutely sublime. Something about railing through the empty woods on a singlespeed gives you time to reflect and clear your head.

As the rain quickened, the leaves on the trail started to get wet and slick, and, through the magic of good timing, I made it off the trail just as the ground started to become saturated. The ride back home on the gravel roads through the north side of the park was equally as awesome…

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.