First Love

Mine began the day I met Ned. My friends had been talking about him for months and I was growing terribly impatient for an introduction. It was Tuesday night and I had just joined the John Henry Ladies' Ride. We'd mostly been biking on Mt. Fromme and thought that perhaps it was time to go over and give Seymour a try.

A few of us who were feeling extra enthusiastic decided to grind our way up the road to meet the rest of the group at the Mushroom Trail parking lot. After an hour of watching cars & trucks heavy laden with bikes fly past, while we sweated and chugged our way upward, I was feeling tired, stinky, and just a little smug. As we approached the trailhead the very last thing on my mind at that moment was love.

And that's when I met Ned. He was everything a newbie like me could want, and everything I'd imagined a North Shore trail should be. The natural terrain was fast & fun, and the stunts were small enough to temp even a chicken like me to at least consider giving them a try.

You see, up till now the shore had definitely been appealing, but I just hadn't felt that 'thing' - there was just no spark, no magic. This probably had a little to do with the fact that most of my rides, up to that point, had been glorified hikes with biking shoes and a 25 pound aluminum pack.

Meeting Ned changed everything. After that first ride I was smitten. We rolled off the trail looking like the wretched survivors of an aussi-rules football match but I knew it was love. Sweaty palms, cotton-ball mouth, watery knees - I felt weak and shaky all over. Definitely love!..or ...maybe dehydration. I just couldn't stop grinning. I wandered through the rest of my week in a euphoric haze.

One of my friends at work jokingly commented, "k - You're still here so you didn't win the lottery, so what's his name?"

"Ned," I replied with a blank, dreamy smile. It took a lot of explaining later that month to get her to believe that Ned was in fact a trail, and not some top secret North Van. hottie.

My romance with Ned lasted the rest of that summer. But, as my riding improved we began to see less and less of each other. Finally, we had to admit that it was over between us, but I did ask him if we could 'still be friends'. It was a hard thing to do, but he understood.

Even now, despite my new love interests, I'll always have a soft spot for Ned. My first love introduced me to the exquisite highs and agonizing, often painful, lows of riding the shore.

Luckily, my new loves are really understanding, they don't mind at all when I occasionally go and spend some quality time with my ex.

Trisha Petrella