new biking buddy

my new biking buddy, Frey (free)

I have been out of town helping my 25 yo son move back home. We have spent about 3 solid weeks together, and are now traveling up I95 back to the Philadelphia area. Not sure many parents would want to spend this much time with a grown child who had been out of the house for the past 3 years. But circumstances have made this a reality.

I have been an "empty nester" for 3 years and have loved it. My son is single and has no obligation to anyone at this time which got me to thinking. Many parents have kids my son's age but most times these kids have boyfriends or girlfriends, or have married or moved in with their special person. But I have come to realize, the age from 25 - 30 is a great time to be with your child. They are not little kids, and have finally become full fledged adults. This stage is kinda unique for the child. He is old enough to be a good friend for his parent and old enough to be way past arguing and fighting.

Once your child pairs up, he or she is basically gone. When they come to visit, they have the spouse or bf or gf with them. So this makes the visit more of an obligation for the spouse or bf or gf.

Now what the heck does this have to do with biking. Well my son is cylist. We somehow got 2 bikes, size 67 cm and 5 wheels into his sedan when packing to move back. Needless to say, we had to mail all of my son's clothes etc home. Bikes took priority. Since he is tall, his bikes are custom. No way he was mailing them home.

So now I have a biking buddy. 20-40 miles for him is just a warm up but for me it is the entire ride. He said any time I want to bike, he will go with me. For the first time in my cyling career, I have a biking buddy. I have always envied ladies who had husbands who would bike with them, although I find many men will not bike with their wives, "too slow they say." But not my son, he said he does not care how slow I go, he can do his fast rides by himself. But he said he would never pass up a chance to bike with me.

So even though my empty nesting is ending, I have gained a biking buddy. I am getting a new custom Spectrum this winter, my son is already one one. Cannot wait to bike even more with my biking buddy.

So whenever life hands you something that you think might be bad, find something good in it. It is always there, just sometimes hard to see right away.