May 23rd has a habit of finding me in transition. In 2001, I was spiraling over relocation logistics, freaking out about how to cover the gap before my signing bonus arrived, and teaching myself C in the meantime. Classic move, learning to code while panicking about rent. You can read that particular meltdown here.
A year later, the tone had shifted. Haircut, laundry, early departure to dodge holiday traffic. A quieter kind of anticipation, the simple pleasure of going to Plattsburgh with the weekend still wide open.
By 2007, May 23rd had found its groove. A road trip through surprisingly gorgeous Idaho, a veggie burger that may have saved my life, and a mountain bike race won on fumes and excellent trail-side coffee. That whole beautiful mess is documented in the 5th Annual Coyote Classic recap.
In 2012, the adventure turned inward, specifically into a dentist's chair, where I apparently dreamed of being run over by a Jeep while getting a cavity drilled. The full near-death experience, such as it was, is right here.
And then in 2022, standing somewhere on a road to nowhere, I looked back at all of it from a distance. That quiet colorscape post sort of says everything without saying much at all.
Twenty-plus years of May 23rds, and the thread running through all of them is movement, toward something, away from something, or just out into the open air to see what happens next.