It came to me in a dream.
Literally.
Let’s go back: It’s the early 90s. I’m under 30 in both years and girth. I’m living in a one-bedroom brownstone apartment with beer in the fridge and a Suzuki GS650G named Wicked Wanda parked in the alley below. Bikes have always been a part of my core (so has beer); and I dreamed a lot about bikes in those days–about the noises they made; about how carburetors worked and gears changed. I remember waking from a terrible dream, one time, in which out-of-synch gears were grinding; steel splines just gnashing and crunching and scraping at high speed. Horrible. Nails on a blackboard horrible.
But I digress…
At some point–I don’t remember the date as writing these things down wasn’t a priority back then–I had one of the most vivid dreams I can recall: A guy told me I would go to Alaska. I guess it doesn’t sound like much now; but at the time it affected me in a deep and profound way. Right to the core. It was as if I were being given a glimpse of what would be at some point in the future; a destiny I needed to fulfill. When I awoke, I felt compelled to pursue this dream.
That’s it. The reason I’m planning this ride to Alaska is because of dream I had years ago. Was I just too fixated on bikes? Did I breath in too much exhaust that particular day? It doesn’t matter, I suppose. What matters is I’ve kept this dream alive since then–all these years, tucked away carefully in a dusty old tin box in the back of my conscious, somewhere way behind my family and career.
And now the time has come blow off the dust and cobwebs; and, at last, release the dream.