Another piece of me is back!

I’ve found another piece of myself, once again, and it feels so wonderful! I’m reeling from joy!

One of the pieces of my pre-pandemic identity used to be “the motorcycle rider”, which is also one of the parts that I identify as my masculine, boyish, wild and playful parts that I love so much and that give me a strong sense of freedom as well as joy.  

In March 2020, I stopped riding my motorcycle and didn’t start again until over a year later, in June 2021: first, I was sick with COVID-19; then, I was slowly recovering and simply too weak, physically, to ride a motorcycle; finally, even when I was better, I still didn’t want an extra risk factor in my life until I was Covid-vaccinated. 

When I started riding again in June of this year, it was really difficult: I could feel the lack of practice. Then, although the muscle memory for the movements and maneuvers came back pretty quickly (which was a relief), my mental state had changed since pre-pandemic, and I felt like I had lost a whole piece of myself — and I was distraught. I couldn’t handle the mental aspect, the fear or anxiety, of riding my motorcycle beyond short easy commutes around my neighborhood and to work. I thought I had lost a part of myself forever… 

Still, I persevered, continuing to ride, and thus practice, on my commutes and slowly going farther distances, on bigger roads, and at higher speeds.

In mid-October I started taking a very low dose of medication for anxiety & depression, and I have been feeling several benefits: I literally feel like something has shifted in my brain, for the better, and that I have reconnected to several parts of myself, that I feel more like myself again, and that my baseline has improved. 

And this week something at once tiny and huge, extremely specific and significant, has clicked: I’m riding my motorcycle again like I used to do pre-pandemic, i.e. feeling like myself on my motorcycle like pre-pandemic. That comfortable, confident (but not overconfident), wild, playful, joyful, boyish me on the motorcycle is back! 

It was so sudden, so unexpected almost, that I can hardly believe it and that’s why I want to write it here, to remember this event and to celebrate these feelings: another vital part of my identity is back — YAY! 

And thanks (to whatever I owe this)!!!