The Header

This shouldn't be that hard.
I mean I do it mostly every month.
Not exactly like clockwork, more like calendar work.
If you know what I mean.
So it was time to change the header pic.
It shouldn't be that hard, but it sort of is.
I mean first you gotta go out and actually take picture.
That's the easy part for I tend to take lots o'pictures.
Not all of them suitable for publication; The Flat Tire after all has standards.
Sort of.
Usually, I like to do something that has to do with a different view, the blog is in one point perspective don't you know.
My own goofy perspective.
So out of all the pictures I take, it should be easy to pick one out and stick up on top.
Well, first you gotta crop it, then size it, mess with the contrast a bit or the color, then see if Blogger doesn't mess it up when you post it up.
I'm no expert, so it usually takes me three or four tries in order to get it right.
Check in at the end of the month and you may witness all sorts of goofiness appear behind the title.
I change it out for I figure if you, the reader, visit a lot, and I hope you visit like as much as you can, in fact make this your homepage, anyways, I figure you get tired of seeing the same thing over and over every time you pop in.
Variety and all that.
I gotta say, sometimes it takes me like hours and hours to get it just right.
Okay, not really.
It does take me some time though.
Well tonight, I was about change the marquee, when I looked at the present picture and I just couldn't change it.
I had this nice image of the boat ramp all ready to go, but I just could not take the old picture down.
It's not a particularly good image, the old one, I mean I didn't have the title in mind when I took it.
I had to crop it a bunch in order to get the composition close to where it looked okay.
The thing is, despite the flaws, I like it.
Not the just the picture, but everything in it.
For one thing, it reminds me of that epic journey I took around Pearl Harbor.
It reminds me of the Hawaiian Monk seals I saw that day, a chance sighting that only happened because I ride a bicycle.
Of course there's the bicycle, the Celeste Devil and all that alloy Italian goodness.
Then there's the ocean.
I've spent a lot of time around the ocean.
Not so much so nowadays, but in all my other lives, it was always there.
I'm not a waterman by any means, one of those who spend their lives around the water, learning the nuances of wind and wave and tide, but I do think of myself as being close to it.
The ocean I mean.
I know enough to enjoy it's beauty and I know enough to know the dangers.
The ocean giveth and the ocean taketh.
Or something like that.
Anyways, that image, the one up on top, gives me a warm fuzzy when I look at it.
It's sort of lonely looking in a way.
I mean the water is nice and the sun is shining and all, but still, there's an emptiness about it that I can't quite figure out.
I think it's because when I look at it, I feel like it's where I'm supposed to be.
I'm supposed to be standing behind my bicycle, there at the beach, not sitting down on the couch typing this out.
I'm supposed to be there, all a huffing and a puffing, letting the ocean breeze cool me down, smelling the salt in the air, listening to the waves break against the white sand.
Worrying about whether or not my frame is going to rust.
Okay, I don't worry about that.
Too much.
The fact that I was there, a huffing and a puffing, taking it all in during that one moment, makes it all the more poignant.
I'd like to go back.
That image shouldn't mean so much to me, I mean I live ten minutes by bicycle away from my own beach, my own ocean breeze and my own little waves lapping against the shore.
I ride by it all the time.
Maybe that's the problem.
I just ride on by.
I should go and let the cool water surround my burning massive thighs.
Get my head wet and blow some bubbles.
Sit on a rock and let the sun dry me off until all that's left are little crystals of salt to brush from my skin.
Let that sun warm me until it's time to jump back in and start the routine again.
Again and again, until the afternoon shadows get long and the sun can longer work it's magic.
Then it would be time to get back on my bicycle and huff and puff my way back home.
My bicycle.
As much a part of my life now as the ocean was back when.
Does the image represent my present visiting my past?
Should I see harmony or conflict?
Maybe I should just see a bicycle at the beach.
Do I think of all those things when I look at that picture?
Perhaps.
All I know is that it's not quite time to take it down.
Maybe next month.