WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

Abrupt, cursory, hasty, headlong, hectic, precipitous, speedy, sudden.

Rushed.

You’re heading out for a ride, the yearly Gathering of the Nortons, and you thought you had plenty of time to set up your machine, your gear, and all the other little things that go along for the ride. You have your cell phone, new sunglasses, and wallet. All placed neatly on the tool caddy. 

You think of yourself as methodical. A man with a plan, and semi-disciplined. Yet things begin to compress the closer the clock swings toward that predetermined launch time, in your mind. Then those hooligans in the left field bleachers start a hollerin’, and the unexpected begins to happen. You realize that it has been a few weeks since you last checked your tire pressure, and even longer for your riding partner's bike - whose motorcycle upkeep has become a task you thought you had happily accepted. (As long as the gourmet meals kept coming). Launch may be in that, should be, pre-planned hold.

Your machine is good. Hers is not. You roll her bike back into the barn, and fire up the compressor - which will need a minute or so to get its mojo going… Right about then the home phone rings and you put down what you are doing and rush – like every drive to a hospital – to grab the phone in the kitchen.

Why we do this is beyond me, as we know it will be some Robo-Call. Yes, we all yearn for a real human to be on the other side.

Oh my God – it is a real person. Your buddy, who called on the old landline as he says you didn't answer your cell – which you have on perpetual silence simply because you think we spend way too much time on these devilish creations. He wants you not to forget that tool you were going to lend him. Right gotcha.

You go outside, grab your phone and turn on the ringer, muttering little bad things about your friend, toss it onto the chair near the bikes. You put the tool he needs in your tank bag – so you don’t forget it.

You add the needed tire pressure to her bike, which was low a few pounds in the back. While on the center stand your hand instinctively slide over to check the chain slack… It is SLACK.

Oh, okay. Riding suits now come off, and tools come out. She goes in to fill up the Camelbaks, which you had neglected, and the cat slips through the door and disappears into a hidden Cat Dimension.

On the TV in your mind, Walter Cronkite has stopped talking about a pre-planned hold and is now bringing up the phrase Launch Window.

She hands you a glass of water and tells you not to get upset, and that you both can always be a little late. With the words a little late you try to remember if you took your amlodipine this morning.

Trying to follow her suggestion, you go to the tool caddy and then wonder who the hell put the torx sockets with the Allen?! Oh, that would have been you rushing around earlier that week trying to get something done between Double and Final Jeopardy.

Dude, take a breath.

All adjusted, ship shape, spick & span, and in fit trim. 

You take a breath… again. She has corralled the cat and he is now looking sadly out the bedroom window at the humans abandoning him yet again for those noisy things. Uncle Walter is now smiling and telling millions that the glitch was fixed, and the launch countdown has restarted, and just a few extra degrees into Earth's daily rotation you both clear the driveway pad, and begin the mission.

A few hours later you run into everyone at the yearly Gathering of the Nortons. Your tool-borrowing buddy comes up through the late morning sun’s glare and says he's been looking for you. He asks if you didn't turn on your phone. You look at him squinting, while at the same time patting your pockets to find your sunglasses. Yes, I turned on my phone. Yep.

,He holds up his phone – it is dialing yours. You all stop. Listening intently. There is nothing to hear.

Back in the barn, on the chair by the bikes, there is a quiet buzzing and a lightly glowing screen, and across the barn, atop the tool caddy the sunglasses take it all in. Take a breath, dude. Take a breath.