White Starling
The wind whipped across Haro Strait into our faces and white caps feathered the water. My friend and I waited patiently to hear the boarding call so the Sidney ferry could take us back to Anacortes and our car. It was 11:15 a.m. and the ship should have sailed at 11:00 a.m.. I bided my time playing with Rosemary and staring off into the water towards the green-jeweled Gulf Islands. An elderly woman with a light blue cotton outfit walked up to my friend and her bike and started a conversation. I couldn't hear all she was saying over the wind, so after a minute I walked over to join them.
My friend immediately brought me up to speed with what the woman was saying. She was inquiring about our trip and telling us how much she loved riding her bike as well. She was 86 years old and rode her bike almost every day, and mentioned how much she loved riding around Orcas Island. However, she lamented that she can’t do something as strenuous as the hills on Orcas anymore, and I joked that she’d have to settle for a ride around “flatter” Lopez Island instead. We smiled and laughed as the woman with the white hair and deeply wrinkled face told us a story of how she celebrated her retirement with other friends her age. They went to Australia for two months and rode around, then took a boat to New Zealand for another two month tour. They camped the whole way. She was 60 at the time! She had that lively, British story-telling vibe to her, reminiscent of all the old adventurous explorers long gone.
She continued to say that even when she feels down, she insists on getting on her bike and going for a ride. Any time she rides, it makes her feel so much better, so alive. She lost her husband a few years ago, which left her with the deep heartache of loneliness. But this woman drove home the point to my friend and I that when she gets on her bike she doesn't feel so lonely any more. It keeps her alive.
I was staring at this beautiful, vibrant woman of 86, with healthy white hair and wrinkled porcelain skin thinking, "I want to be riding a bike when I'm 86 years old. I want to live to be like her, to tell such passionate stories of how I spent my time living a full life. I need to be strong enough to break through the loneliness and sadness with the help of my bike and to become a wise, aged woman like her." Standing in front of the woman as she talked with us and the salt water wind messed our hair, I cried a little (like I always do) because I had felt so alone from a recent heartbreak and had come on this trip with my bike to try and escape it. The woman had no idea what her words meant to me. My emotions were hidden behind my sunglasses staring into the morning sun.
She told us to have a lovely trip, and as soon as we met her, she was gone. I didn't get her name. She left before I could grab my camera out of my bag and capture her picture, her essence of how I want to grow old. I cried a little more, thinking of her long life with her beloved husband, growing old into their wrinkly old age together and how he must have beamed at her beauty and love for an adventurous life. They must have created such wonderful stories together. But now she was alone, and looked to her bike as her salvation, her best friend to carry her through the lonely times. Just like me.
I can’t help but think I met her for a reason. Thank you, white starling, for visiting me and whispering your message. I was listening.
