It's time.

This morning, I scraped ice of my car's windscreen and marvelled at the gossamer-thin shavings of ice. So delicate that a single breath with melt them in mid air as they blew away. In my had, it felt like the must luxurious fabric that disappeared into tiny water drops the moment I blinked.

Then I wondered why I was driving still to work. Why was I not yet on my bike? A few short weeks ago I was living the life of a full time cyclist in St. George, Utah. Everything I did was centred around the bike ride. The eating, the lounging, the washing, the blogging and even the Facebooking. It was all about ride that day, or the one that would be the following day.

Then I returned home. the more than 600 km of riding the highways of southwest Utah became no more than a memory of red rock, smiling faces and Veyo Pies.

It was easy to fall back into the old ways - the ways that I've relearned during this easy year of making excuses and making allowances for my aching foot.

It has been easy. Possibly, it has been the worst winter I've ever experience in my almost two decades on the prairies. It is not that it has been colder than ever...it was just always cold and windy and just gross. Spring was shown itself to be no different. Second week of April and it is still just gross and cold and windy.

In previous years, with an Ironman as a motivator,  I had no problem fighting through this inertia. It was a case of train now or show up for the race and experience even more unnecessary pain.

Out the window right now,  the morning sun has gone into hiding behind thick cloud. and it is cold again. Mind you "April cold, not January cold", it is all relative.

But it is time.

It is time to break out the commuting bike. It is time to ramp up the mileage on the run. It is time to spend more time in the pool. It is time to get back on the highway with the Dirty Girl!

It is time to rip open this Jamaican coffee that I've been saving, because it, like me, isn't getting any better just sitting around in a burlap bag.

Why? Well, it isn't really because I have lots of "little" races coming quickly in this "easy" year of mine.

It is because I've seen this pattern of slippage before. In an earlier life, years went by before I even acknowledged the unstoppable slide into decrepitude, the slide into someone that I never want to be again.

That is not a place I want to even visit again. The pain in my foot, the crappy weather, the lame excuses. They really are nothing more than a way to avoid returning to the race. Not any particular race. The race that has no start or finish line. The race that has no competitors and no spectators and no volunteers.

This is a race that has no medals at the end, no technical shirt or other swag and no food along the way. This is a race that finds you in a corridor of doors and mirrors. It is full of choice. But when you sit down and ponder...you still have to look at yourself and where you are. I have to. I have to figure out where to put my focus lest I return to my previous state of cosmopsis.

I find it very interesting that at this date exactly last year I was musing the same thoughts, albeit with a much more positive outlook. Even the theme of that blog was the same "Is it time yet?"

Maybe it is a cyclical thing. Maybe I require a certain amount of natural lumens from the sun before I can kick myself into action. Time will tell. Time will come Time will pass.

It's time.