It would seem that Dad and I rode our bikes a total of about nine miles yesterday, round trip, on the Foothills Trail in and around Buckley, WA, which is about 24 miles east of Tacoma, or more specifically, 26 miles east of the State Route 512 Park & Ride, which I took my bike down to on the Sound Transit 594 "Express" bus, a roughly 80-minute ride, to meet up with Dad and then drive the rest of the way to Buckley with him in his car.

I rode my bike from home to the #594 stop at 9th & Stewart, thus not bothering with a connecting bus to get down there, about a mile away. Riding the bike there was obviously just easier. The bus picked me up three minutes delayed, at 9:50 a.m, but arrived at the Park & Ride on time at 11:10. Dad was already there, but was away from his car as he'd decided to go to the McDonald's nearby to use the bathroom. I seem to need to learn a hard lesson myself on that front, that being the need not just to pee before I leave (which I did—twice!), but simply not to drink any liquids whatsoever at least an hour, maybe more, before I leave. Because even though I peed before leaving, I really had to go again within about 45 minutes, and by the time I got to the Park & Ride I was truly desperate for a bathroom. I locked my bike at a nearby bike lock and went myself to the Wendy's across the street. Thank God they didn't have a security code on their bathroom or any insistence that I buy something.

When I walked back, Dad had returned to the parking lot, and was standing maybe thirty feet from his car, looking my direction as I crossed the parking lot toward him. His hair is mostly white now, mostly confined to the sides of his head just like Grandpa's used to be (though to be fair, Dad still has more hair on the top than Grandpa ever did in my memory), and is basically all white. I hate to say this, but he looked . . . kind of old. I'm still not really used to clocking the noticeable effects of my parents aging. I mean, to be fair, he is 67 years old.

Also to be fair, yesterday in particular, I could not quite tell how his seeming older than I had ever clocked before was due to actual aging, or his weakened state after six weeks of constant radiation treatment for prostate cancer. Surely there's some level of a mix of both (I'm noticing the effects of aging with Sherri too, and she hasn't had cancer), but also I'm certain that with Dad, the vast majority of it is the recent treatments. And, even more significantly, even though he's been finished with radiation treatments since before Easter, he still has to get these shots for continued treatment for a while every few weeks or something—and his most recent was just the day before yesterday, and Dad said it really did a number on him. He could barely walk with the pain in his hip from it on Monday, and he was still hurting from it yesterday. He did test whether he could even ride his bike, and evidently that puts strain on muscles that were unaffected by the shot, so he was all set for the bike ride.

That said, he still tired quickly, which I am also certain was more from the recent treatment, particularly the recent shot—and, probably to an extent, his not having been riding his bike otherwise at all lately. More than once during the ride, he had to stop and rest, which of course was fine. At one stop, we sat for a few minutes at one of the surprisingly large number of benches along the Foothills Trail, and he strained rather vocally just when he had to stand up again.

Which is to say, this is the unfortunate thing: Dad seemed sort of old yesterday, in a way he usually doesn't—but I really think that was the prostate cancer treatment more than anything. Although he did ponder on whether he'd ever regain the same kind of strength he once had just by virtue of his age, I think our next bike ride probably won't be quite like this, in terms of how quickly he tired from it. He even mentioned a bike ride we did just a few years ago, when he was totally fine and I was the one who was exhausted (and in my case it was just because I didn't bike longer distances the way he was then used to). It felt rather like the roles had been reversed yesterday.

Regardless of all of that, we both found this section of Foothills Trail—which we rode a different section of for my Birth Week in 2018 coming the opposite direction from Puyallup (in fact, we were slightly disappointed to learn that we had turned back all of about a mile from the point we rode to that last time; oh well, Dad had said he was too tired to go further and that was most important)—quite delightful. Dad had been under the impression that we would be riding a much shorter stretch than we did, with dead ends at rivers on both sides. But, although we almost immediately found a dead end the White River when we rode to the northeast at first, it turned out the trail had no block to the southwest, and we only turned around once we reached the far end of a beautiful wooden arched bridge over the South Prairie Creek.

We both loved that bridge, and were really happy we had decided to round one last arc of the trail just to see what was on the other side of it. This was after crossing a smaller bridge over a ravine, which itself was so far below the trail in elevation when we first saw it, Dad wasn't even convinced it was part of the same trail. But, the trail takes such wide arcs, that even returning that surprisingly significant an elevation was not too great a challenge.

The trail also had rather frequent markers, that I wish now I had taken at least one picture of, telling riders to call 911 in case of emergency—and to give a location number, also listed on it. That level of safety precaution taken by whoever built the trail was very impressive to both of us.

So anyway, although the ride overall, of nine miles, was not a particularly great distance, it still had more than its fair share of delights and was absolutely worth the time and effort for both of us. Once we rode back to the town of Buckley, Dad and I went to where he wanted to get our lunch, Wally's Drive-in, which he had checked to make sure had a vegetarian option for me. And indeed they did; I had a mushroom swiss "Beyond burger," and it was actually delicious, not because of the patty—I find Beyond to have among the least flavorful veggie meats—but because of the special "Wally's sauce" they used. For the same reason, Dad was impressed with his burger as well.

Dad made the smart decision to skip any fries, so he wouldn't get sleepy driving home. I, on the other hand, got both tater tots and a milkshake, both because I hadn't had one in ages, and because they had Peanut Butter as a flavor option. Yum! I got a "regular" size. the smallest available, and I still only drank half of it. As I noted to Dad, I got what I needed out of it. Why pack even more calories unnecessarily?

Dad then drove us back to the SR 512 Park & Ride, in time for me to catch the 3:35 bus back. And guess what? No reading my book this time: I could not stay awake. I snoozed nearly the whole way back to Seattle. At least that made the ride go by quickly.

I did stay awake long enough, at least, to edit together a couple of videos I took on the bike ride, and add a song about bike riding to it, or my TikTok account, and thus all my other socials as well.

[posted 10:40 am]