Now we negotiate...

So as I began to leave work today, I felt ill. I was tired and nauseous. The problem was that I needed to ride home.

So I grabbed my bag to go to the locker room to change. The entire time as I walked down the stairs, as I opened my locker, as I changed my clothes, as I locked my locker, as I walked to my bike, pumped my tires (Megan, your pump is really good!), climbed on to the bike, and clipped my foot into the peddle, I was negotiating with my body. I still felt quite ill. A headache was developing...

I had, as we call it in the endurance sport world, bonked. Bonking is caused by an imbalance of fluids, calories, energy reserves, amount of sleep, and general constitution.

Between a sleepless night, lack of enough calories in my dinner (I am trying to lose weight), an improper breakfast, and not enough water and electrolytes throughout the day, I was definitely not in peak condition to ride home.

Another reason might have been it was our first day of above 75 degree weather.

Anyway, standing legs straddled across my bicycle, I strapped on my helmet. The shear feel of the constraining straps across my neck almost made me vomit. Four feet away was my car. In my back pocket were the keys. Then began the negotiation.

"A few miles, we can make it a few miles. If we make it to East Falls Church we can hop on the Metro..."

Then, out of the office came one of colleagues. He too is a bike a commuter. His commute is slightly shorter than mine (7 miles). I start to chat with him and I convince myself if I ride for a little bit, I will probably work out my nausea.

We crossed the street together to the W&OD Trail (mile 17). His commute takes him west; mine goes east. At this point, I thought I really was going to vomit... And yet, what do I do? I joined my colleague westbound.

A few miles later, I finally make the turn eastbound. At this point, the nausea had passed but the headache was strong. The effort to maintain minimum speed to retain my balance on the bike felt monumental. And yet, I see another colleague running along the trail. I again turn westbound to chat for awhile.

I think at this point I had decided I was done and it was less than a mile back to the office and my car. After chatting a little while, I returned to proper course.

Now I approached my start point. My car in sight up ahead. My car in sight to the right. My car out of sight behind me. I negotiated again with my body. "We can make the Metro station."

It was a very painful 10 miles to East Falls Church. Twice I dry-heaved and yet I held the course. Both times in front of very cute joggers. Finally, I approached the Metro stop. My head began to churn. I made a little circle as I approached the turn-off. "Rosslyn," I said, aloud I think. I'm pretty sure I was delirious at that point.

I now was heading to just outside the city, five miles from home, but mostly downhill. Again, the turn-off came and went. I had decided that it would take longer to take the Metro home at this point.

I arrived home, still very nauseous, still with a large headache. And yet, I had ridden 30 miles this way. I had convinced my body that it could do it and it did.

Now, I'm going to go pass out and do it all over again tomorrow.