St. Paul, MN

Last summer, I rode a bicycle from Chicago, IL to Devil's Lake, ND. Since I've never written about the adventure, and since it was a long December as far as temperatures went, I thought January might be a good time to talk about summer 2008. January is Bike Month at the Drawing Board.

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Most of the morning was a blur. Our friends would be leaving after lunch, and Paul and I would be on our own. We'd carry our own gear now, on our backs and not in a van. We didn't have turn-by-turn directions or predriven routes. We had a couple of bikes and about 40 pounds of luggage.

I was excited because a certain girlfriend of mine had made me lunch reservations at a swank sushi joint in downtown St. Paul. It was the first nice meal I'd had in weeks and would be the last one for even longer. I was excited for a break between what had become in indecipherable string of Italian meals.

First we raced into town to find a homeless shelter with nationally-recognized award-winning gardens. It was an odd combination, but there we were, on our hands and knees, picking weeds, surrounded by topiaries and beds of colored impatients. We got lost in the gardens, buried by a mountain of flowers, and for a moment we'd forget where we were. But we were right there, surrounded by manicured beauty surrounded again by poverty.

We left after our work was done and found our way quickly to the place. We walked in, wandered aimlessly and then I heard a tiny whisper. I don't like to wax poetic, so I won't. But Lindsay was there, and my excitement, coupled with the ridiculousness of my bike shoes meant that I nearly toppled a table of innocent and terrified teenage girls.

I learned quickly that St. Paul was the home of Charles Shultz. The downtown is decorated thoroughly with statues of the Peanuts characters, and it's one town that enamored me almost immediately.* I flatted out on a city street, drank a beer downtown, and we all found our way to friends in Woodbury.

* That having been said, I would not want to be there right now. Yikes.

It might have been the best day of my life.