The summer has zipped by in rather frightening fashion. It’s only two months until Braking AIDS Ride 2013 begins, which means I need to put in some back-to-back long training rides this weekend.

Bearings, for sale here, Charles A. Cox, c. 1890. Courtesy of Posters: Artist Posters Collection, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

In my fantasy version of doing back-to-back training rides, a fantasy that tends to dominate my foggy, exhausted thinking at 6:00am on Saturday morning when I’d rather remain in bed, the weather will be as beautiful and mild as it’s been most of this week, the wind will be at my back, the hills will feel like flats, the flats will feel like downhills, and the downhill cruises will feel like heaven on earth. In that imaginative rewrite of my training days, it feels as though the leg power of five other women are powering me and my bike, and the riding is such a piece of cake to us, we’re all reading fashion magazines as we cycle. (For anyone who’s asking, in the illustrated rendition of this fantasy above, I’m the raven-haired woman in front of the blonde caboose rider.)

In reality, it’ll be me, by myself, pedaling on my own steam, trying as best I can to push myself but also live into whatever my body can do that day and whatever the road brings me. What’s nicer about the reality version: Nothing feels better than the moments when I work hard and it pays off. Sure, it would be easier if the roads all felt flat, but then, so would my mood. The highs are that much sweeter when they are hard-won. So, whatever comes these next weeks, bring it on.

On the other hand, while I can forgo the other five women helping me pedal, but if anyone knows where I can get those amazing, red knee-high cycling socks, please contact me ASAP.

To support me and my invisible tandem-bike harem to support Housing Works and fight AIDS, you can still donate here!  I’m at 54% of my $10,000 goal, a sum that’s been achieved, to my amazement, in only a month. So, I’m more than halfway there, and the rest, I hear, is, well, at least partially downhill. Donate early and often!