Some of you who have been reading my recent entries have asked me how I’m keeping my marbles together. The short answer is probably: perspective. There really hasn’t been any time in my life that I can recall where I wasn’t struggling with something, and there have been several times when that struggle has been pretty intense and all-pervasive. I seem to have an aversion to doing things the easy way, metaphysically and otherwise. I can look back on other times of struggle and note that I didn’t die, and eventually, things got better. I am making the optimistic assumption that things will get better than this, too. If I can just keep it together for a little while longer, something will give way and improvement will begin. That’s what I tell myself, anyhow.

In the meantime, it’s stressful waiting for the wind to change. I deal with it by writing, dancing, having wild junglesex with my husband whenever possible, and I’ve recently discovered I have a special talent for destruction.

In the last week, my boss at the bike shop has given me a wheel and two frames to demolish. Why would I be demolishing these things, you might ask. Well, when a bicycle company offers a lifetime warranty on their products, it will replace a cracked or damaged frame for free. When that happens, the mechanic has to take all the old parts off the damaged frame, put them on the new frame, and then destroy the old one so nobody tries to build it up and ride it. It’s a safety thing. Yeah, that’s it. So I take said frame out into the alley and go 2001 on its ass: monkey noises, smashing against the ground, pounding with sledge hammer (no old bones lying around), beating against the dumpster (because both dumpster and frame ring out loud when you do that).

When you’ve destroyed a bike frame with your bare hands, you really get quite a lot of respect. People move out of your way. They gape and stare, sometimes shift uncomfortably, sometimes look at you admiringly, and nobody would give you so much as a microgram of crap. The best thing, though, is the release. It is soooo good–it’s smoke a cigarette and take a nap good. It really takes the kinks out.

My only reservation about this is that I think my boss may have some kind of amazon fetish. He seems to be coming up with just about any reason to have me smash something up. I think I don’t care, though. Whatever keeps the destruction material coming.

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