first

i'm getting ready for the biggest ride of my life,

i feel worried starting this blog now, i'm half way tired but unable to sleep.

i'm in a place of transition. the rides not for another year but i'm already closing doors, tying up loose ends, letting go of my day to day.

because i need hard line motivation, i put myself in a situation where i have to leave the US for 6 months. this is my test run. if i can set up my life in such a way that leaving for this long doesn't ruin everything i've worked for, well, then i might make it the two years i'm expecting to ride my bike. from anchorage alaska, to some where south in argentina,

i'm going to do that ride.

and i feel like it is "that ride", like the more i read online blogs, the more i see that i am by no means the first, or even the 100th to do this ride. and probably in the year that i'm getting ready to do this, the number of people who have already will double. but this doesn't make me feel less adventurous, i'm thrilled that bike touring is catching on. it does make me nervous that by the time i am ready to ride my bike, people won't be as eager to hear the story as they are now.

i worry not for my ego, (an easy thing to say) but rather cause i actually want to say something this time.

most of my travel has always been for selfish endeavors. self growth, self healing, self esteem, they've been intense, but always a man verses himself type of story. this time, i want to talk about the people. yeah, i want to learn too. it's kinda selfish, but i want to regurgitate all that knowledge as soon as i can, to every one i encounter. i want to be the poster child of the bike revolution! but not really, i more want to be the person wheat pasting that poster all over the world. maybe i'm searching for the poster child, or the designer that will bring about change.

ok ok, the plan:

i want to visit as many collectives as i can and volunteer there for a few days, learn how they operate. talk to them about what works for them, note any advice they have for starting a collective, and then discuss what i have learned in my experience. my experience is that i helped start a bike collective in portland, OR (where one can learn to fix their own bike bikefarm.org) and then kept it going for three years. i learned so much about organizing, and consensus decision making, and non-hierarchal governance. i learned about budget making, and business dealing, simple economics and tax law. but mostly i learned how to build community, enriching friendships that inspire.

i have this idea to some how connect all these bike collectives. and like the ride itself, i am not the first to try. Bike Bike! is doing a good job so far, yet their directory of bike collectives is five years old. i want to help them update that.

i also have this idea that there are many "bike farm's" out there ready to sprout, hence my bike tour name, bike seeds. i want to spread bike seeds all over the country, showing people just how easy it can be to start a collective. i want to help people find funding thro grants or thro micro financing, or even just thro asking people for donations of tools. i want there to be a bike farm, or bike kitchen, or bike church (all different names of collectives which operate in a very similar way to bike farm) in every city with a biking population. i want to stimulate the biking community is small towns. i even have fantasies about collecting data regarding the bike-ability of these small towns as i pass thro them. my god, i could go on for pages about what all i want to get done.

but i'll spread that out.

i find that once i start talking about this trip, i just can't shut up. but it can't be all talk. i've got a lot of research to do, i've got to come up with some words that are worth hearing.