Plan B

The self-pity faded as quickly as the pain of my broken bone.  It's hard to say whether the opiates had anything to do with that.  One thing was certain: I would not be riding any longer.  The brutal finality of this fact shook the foundations of my resolve.  The future, previously a vaguely transparent shroud, became a vacuum; its emptiness paralyzed me.  The thought repeated itself endlessly, This is over; it is time to go home.  Yet the thought would invariably lead along the same track, a future self facing regret.  And what was home anyway?  I could appreciate the idea that this accident was meant to happen, but this was not the way it was meant to end.  That was the seed of hope.

What I spawned was an alternative plan.  First an inventory:

• left arm - unusable
• right arm - ready for the task at hand
• bicycle - unusable, would need to be eliminated
• shelter - available in Garden City as long as necessary
• clothing - I would need to reequip myself for pedestrian life
• mobility - limited by my bike and gear; my legs felt stronger than I could remember

Then a thought.  I had planned a rendezvous with Emily in Boulder, CO before this setback.  She would be traveling West from Philadelphia.  Perhaps she could scoop me up from my Kansas prison and bring me to Denver.  From there I could flip the coin that would decide my fate: East or West.  And here I must credit Emily who provides proof that a door is never closed without another being opened.  For when she heard my proposition, she responded, 'why don't you just come with me to Seattle?'