OK, I did, but then I go cycling every day. So what is so different today, you may ask. The honest answer is that I don’t know why it was different, only that it was.
I set off from home riding in the sunshine, with the temperature a reasonably pleasant 16 C. All the way out on Embankment road, past the Marsh Mills roundabout, past Coypool and out on the Plym Valley cycle path. The same route I’ve done so often before.
I didn’t have a clear idea exactly how far I was going to go and my only limitation was that I had to be back in time to pick up my daughters’ from their primary school. Or rather pick one of them up – my youngest wanted to cycle in this morning, so I cycled with her. My eldest daughter is a very promising swimmer, and she follows a hectic training schedule, so she preferred being driven to school. As a result, my wife dropped her at school, and was going to collect her, too.
Using my phone, I filmed part of the ride, from between Cann Quarry viaduct to the old Bickley station. I also took a photo of my hybrid:
Absolutely nothing amazing happened on the ride – no talking bushes, no parting of waters, nothing. Well, aside from the one or two bugs I swallowed along the way!
After having cycled through the tunnel, I figured I may as well continue on to Yelverton. When faced with the choice of the unpaved cycle path vs the steep uphill road, I chose the road and I’m pleased to say I didn’t stop once going up that hill.
In Yelverton I treated myself to a delicious slice of coffee & walnut cake at Sonya’s Cafe, and washed it down with a cup of coffee. And then it was time to cycle back.
Now to be fair, I flew back and there were very few places where my speed dropped below 20 mph. At some stage I realised I was grinning, and more than that – I’d been grinning for most of the ride.
This realisation started me thinking (and typically that’s reason to start worrying) and I realised that I must have been grinning most of the way to Yelverton. See, almost everybody I passed along the way smiled at me, or rather smiled back at me.
So there you have it: I went cycling and it obviously created enough happiness to leave me grinning practically all the way! Have you ever had a day where you ended up doing something simple that made you happy? If so, then you’d know how I felt.
