Tour de chance

So I took up bicycling.\nI think it had something to do with the boredom of sitting in an empty apartment with nothing to do but read. I resigned myself to exploring the southern fringes of rural Bloomington. I unlocked the '82 Schwinn Le Tour from the back fence and headed south.\nAfter fumbling awkwardly with my gears, I decided that it would be the hills, rather than traffic, that would be my end. I was already thick with sweat when I pedaled by Bachelor Middle School, a daunting building that is almost aggressive in design.\nI ended up running into a dead-end neighborhood and walking across a field to find Clear Creek Trail, a beautifully paved path that led me to a construction site. I felt my curiosity driving me to the half-finished building, where a shirtless man in a giant truck nodded at me and, to my surprise, got out of the truck.\nIt turns out that the construction is a brand new hotel complete with condos, a climbing wall and a bar. The gentleman spoke of his project with pride and a hint of a southern accent. \n"If the city'll let me do it, I'd love to dig a channel through here," he said. "Kind of like that East Race up north." \nI saw the sunlight was starting to fade, so I continued on a road that I thought would take me home. The only real landmark around was a Phillips 66 gas station, so I headed in to ask for directions.\nInside were two women behind the counter, one with an unmistakable yet indefinable accent from overseas. After asking her if she knew how I could get home, she whipped out a Bloomington area phone book and started looking for where we were.\nA young male patron of the 66 came into the minimart, bought a solitary package of Trolli Sour Gummi Worms with a $20 bill and asked what we were looking for. As it turned out, I was a mile or so farther west then I wanted to be. He recommended a path. But did I take his sage advice?\nOf course not. Instead I tried to take a shortcut through what appeared to be a car graveyard. As I was flying down the gravel pathway, I felt my back tire slip and I plunged sidelong into what appeared to be an old Corsica. After checking for bruises and broken bones, I got back on the bike and headed toward an illuminated garage at the center of the junkyard.\nThen I see it. From around the corner of the garage strolled out a giant dog. My first and only instinct -- run like hell! \nI pedaled as fast as I could despite the aching pain and strange gear ratio. I continued to pedal until I was out of the junkyard and well down the street. I mustered the courage to look behind me.\nThe dog was gone. I had outrun death!\nI headed back to the 66 and followed the path that gummi worm-guy had laid out for me. In 20 minutes I was chaining the old bike to the back fence.\nI swore to myself I would never go out on that thing again. Surprisingly, though, I was out again the next day. I seem to have discovered a bit of explorer/adventurer in myself that I never knew I had -- a sense that one can't spend four years locked in the bubble of campus and one shouldn't be afraid to explore the chaos that surrounds them.\nAnd all it took for me was some boredom and a huge dog.