A few days ago I stopped in Williams Lake, BC while on tour and got chatting with a mountain biker who works for the Boys and Girls Club. Through the last decade or so he has been taking kids on mountain bike rides and getting them hooked on the sport. He invests his time with these kids, he hangs out with them, teaches them, and is real with them. He gets them in to the mountains on camping/bike trips so they can experience Nature. He has fun with them.

He was telling me that he has now been doing this for long enough to see kids that have gone from stealing cars as young lads to being hooked on riding, then on to making decent lives for themselves in the ‘real world’. How cool is that.

Another story the local bike shop owner in Smithers told me was of the ski coach in town; he had run an ski club for years and coached so many young athletes through the years. His title was perhaps ski coach, but in reality, his most important contribution was as a role model. Tragically he passed away from health issues, and at his funeral, they opened the floor up, and 30+ of his former club members came up and gave accounts on how much of a positive difference this man made in their lives.

These two examples are of people who invested their time with youth, and built relationships with them; they are incredible role models even if they don’t think themselves to be.

I endeavor to be a positive role model for the younger generation too, but my method is quite different from above. I tent to interact with large numbers of youth for a very short time. The interaction is often one way (me talking to them) whether it be at a 15 minutes long show, or an hour long school presentation; sometimes I get to know a student or two that help me set up, and again, that is very short lived. Or maybe I go on a mountain bike ride with a school group, and hang out with them for a bit, again, very brief. I am hopeful these brief interactions are inspirational in some way , otherwise I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing; but I’m curious as to whether speaking to large groups of students for shorter periods is as beneficial compared to spending a longer time with just a few individual students. I know the circumstances and values of each approach are unique and both offer positives, but nonetheless I’m curious. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

 

I am sitting here in the McBike Shop in Smithers, BC, catching up on some e-mail after presenting at two schools today, one high school and one elementary.

So depending on the age of the students, I change some of my speech and the tone in which I present. But for the younger grades, I imagine much of what I say goes right over their heads. That doesn’t worry me too much though, I think it’s my actions, and the way I present myself that does translate through for them. It is much like parenting I guess, no matter how often and firmly you tell your children something that you don’t do yourself; they won’t adopt the lesson.  The ‘ol ‘do as I say, not as I do’ adage.

On a totally different note, Caryn and I just finished renovating our bathroom, so we were without a shower in the house for about a month, so it wasn’t so convenient to have a quick shower whenever we wanted. During this time I think I averaged about 3 showers a week! As far as I know I’m not offending anybody with terrible body odor, nor do I all of a sudden appear scruffy to those I interact with during the day (except when I don’t shave), so I started thinking about the necessity of showering…..can’t believe I’m blogging about showers…

Most people I know shower once a day, and I know plenty of people that actually have to shower to wake up in the morning, then again later on to wash the days grime away. Whew! Back 50 years ago or more, the story was different, the odd bath here and there was all that was needed. For active people like you and myself, we have to be careful; a hard day of working out or a messy mountain bike ride, and a quick shower is a good thing. But it seems we have become a shower-crazed society, so I thought I’d come up with just a few reasons to perhaps skip a shower or two:

-an average shower uses 160 Liters of water

-it takes a lot of energy to heat all that water

- it takes a lot of commercial product to wash skin and hair that probably doesn’t need washing day in and day out

-your body has to work overtime to produce oils for the skin only to be washed off over and over again, skin can get rather dry this way….but of course you can buy product to solve that problem…

-all that product goes down the drain

-that extra half hour you save can be used to work on your wheelies outside the front door

That concludes my shower blurb….more from my BC road trip soon.