Ride

In Chicago, Ursula rides her cruiser bicycle on the Lakefront trail every day, even when the weather willl not offer its blessing. She rode on Friday in April. Heading southbound, she laughed at Michigan’s waves boiling up and the splash shooting off cold fireworks against the breakers. Ursula thought a big lady must be taking a bath somewhere way out there; she's rolling over; she's kicking up all the chaos. Ursula cruised at 20 miles per hour while she continued southward; she was much too proud to realize it was the tail wind pushing her. She thought: my, today I do ride fast; must be shaping up. Then she U-turned herself around and the wind nearly scooped her arse clean off the bicycle seat. She pedaled against the wind for hours at the slowest speed. She thought: well, endurance is much more interesting than speed, anyway. When she arrived home, her roommate, Mister Toro—who has golden teeth and would have been the next in line to wear the mask of Zorro if he weren’t so notorious for his bad breath—told her, “Why, you look like you’ve lost fifty pounds since this morning! And just look at your thighs. They are so…firm!” Ursula blushed. “Why, thank you, Goldie Chops.” She called him Goldie Chops when they were in a more buddy-buddy mood. Then he lifted his mask. “You’re welcome, Pursula!” That’s what he called her when he wanted to borrow some money. “Tell me,” he continued, “what was this morning’s bike ride really like?” She sighed. “If you must know, Mister Toro,” she used his common name, which meant she wouldn’t loan him any more money, “it was like wrestling The Angel.”