On Bike Rides and Ineffecient Time Investment

For a few weeks, I've desperately been wanting to ride Goshen Canyon. There's no logical explanation for my devotion to this canyon - it's certainly not anywhere near the most spectacular in Utah, it's a short 10 mile ride so it's barely enough to get your pulse moving, it's 45 minutes away. But I think it's awfully pretty and the canyon holds a bunch of happy memories for me, including being on the route of the very first century ride I completed.

Anyway, with all of the organized rides cancelled this year, I've had "Ride Goshen Canyon" on my family activity wishlist all summer. 

Last Sunday we had the perfect weather, Ben had a unicycling friend over who wanted to take a ride, and we decided to (i.e. I talked my family into) take a ride in Goshen Canyon. 

And then reality sunk in. Steve needed to change his bike tube. I needed to get the tandem bike shipshape. We needed to figure out how to get 6 people, an ebike, a tandem, a youth road bike, and two 36-inch unicycles into vehicles. The best vehicle to take would be Rainy, but she was rather stubbornly refusing to start. We had to figure out our one-way route plan (who was dropping off a vehicle? How would they return to the rest of us? A fox, a chicken, and a bag of corn want to cross a river...). It was now closing in on 4 pm and we still had a 45-mintue drive ahead of us. All for a 10-mile bike ride. Really?

I was ready to throw in the towel. The effort just didn't seem worth it. Hours of prep for maybe 50 minutes of riding? The return on investment just wasn't there.

I've definitely been experiencing a scarcity mindset when it comes to time. There are so many reasons - my Western, perfectionist culture, a season of life when time comes at a premium (4 kids, working full-time, finishing a big construction project this summer), and my own "take every moment captive" mentality... it's particularly easy for me to prioritize activities that provide obvious output or are the fastest way to tick an item off my list.=

It's not all bad, this prizing of effeciency. But it's not all good, either. It's easy for me to miss out on the joy of creating and the sheer pleasure of doing something for the doing's sake rather than primarily for the fulfillment of its output.

And so I especially treasured the feeling of the setting autumn sun on my face, the happy chatting with my girls as we coasted downhill, the fun of my husband buzzing ahead on his ebike to snag photos of us (and, also, to show off how fast he could go), the ravenous consumption of a 7:30 pm dinner at Wendy's.  I appreciated the reminder that sometimes the ratio of enjoyment-to-preparation isn't linear. It was an awfully good time, inefficient time investment and all.

It can be awfully challenging to get a selfie of 3 gals while riding, especially when 2 are on a tandem!

I love that you can see the tandem's shadow in this pic

Our hearty unicycle riders took the canyon both ways to add some extra miles to the outing!

Goshen Canyon may not be the most spectacular in Utah, but it's still pretty great

The home stretch! Our unicyclers definitely earned their Frostys.