Life and Death, Part II

Driving to Mt. Palomar this morning with my friend Chuck Chen, we talked of the recent deaths.  Chuck also knows David Slaton, who was riding with Don Murphy when he was killed in the hit-and-run described in my last post.  Without knowing exactly what was amiss, I expressed my uneasiness with many of those in attendance, including the family, saying that they knew they would soon be reunited with Don in the next world. 

Now, I'm not one to challenge peoples beliefs if they help them make sense of the world.   You can't argue with what works; "whatever gets you through the night".  But the cavalier and glib reaction of some of those speaking about this death simply did not do justice to the present.  My goodness, this is someone that was cut-down in the prme of his life.  Passing it off as a temporary inconvenience (ok, I'm exaggerating, but you get the idea) seems to me to cheapen life, not honor it.

On a positive not, the riding and company today was terrific. It was Chuck Chen and myself, and two other riders:  Mark Pavelka from San Diego county and Blake Barnett from Aliso Viejo.  We did the South Grade of Mt. Palomar twice. We planned to climb up south grade, then down east, then up east and down south, but on the first climb up south grade there was a strong northerly wind blowing and it was especially windy around the ridges, so we figured it would be so windy on the east grade that we decided to repeat the climb on east grade rather than trying south.  After the second climb up to the top, we rode to the viewpoint at the campground from where you have almost a 360 degree view:  to the east and north, San Gregornio, San Jacinto, even Mt Baldy, and to the west and south and west, Catalina, Coronado Islands, and Mexico. Terrific day.

Above:  Mark and Chuck

Above: Mark, Blake, Chuck, and Dan

Above:  Dan and Mark