Colorado :: Surfeit of Passion: the Art and Life of Kathleen King

I didn’t get to go to the Tour de France this year…but a few little Bike Scribbles sure did!

It’s moving day. Cyberspace moving day. My blog and website are being merged, along with a new Bike Scribble store. Today. Literally a year of preparation has passed to arrive at this moment. It has been a jam-packed year on terra firma as well. This time last year I was leaving Cortez, Colorado for Santa Barbara, California after finishing the big mural for Chris Carmichael at CTS and planning for Interbike 2009. I just arrived back in Cortez two weeks ago after spending the previous 9 months in California’s central coast near San Luis Obispo. I have murals to paint here, and, of course, Interbike 2010 is only six weeks away. This area of Southwestern Colorado, Pagosa Springs to Durango, Dolores, on past Cortez to the Four Corners Monument, is filled with awe-inspiring natural beauty and endless cycling opportunities…. But more on that later. Now for…

pendant with original 1km

The BIG NEWS at hand: Bike Scribble Pendants!!

Several months ago, while at a planning meeting for SLO Gran Fondo in San Luis Obispo, I had the great pleasure of meeting Tess Stapleton, who is chairing the SLO Gran Fondo event. Tess saw the Bike Scribbles and suggested they would be great on jewelry. That idea had never crossed my mind, but one of her friends knew of a jeweler in town who might be right for the concept and we started talking. Jeweler Lisa Leonard just happened to have a husband who was crazy about cycling and they both loved the idea. Lisa created a mock up and we showed it to Tess. Tess and her husband, Bob, happen to own a little professional cycling team called HTC-Columbia who would soon be racing in the Tour de France. Tess ordered 30 of them on the spot to give as gifts to team members while at the race. We kept it quiet so the team could have time with their unique gift. The exclusive team design included the special charm “tdf 2010″. Only HTC Columbia’s pendants come with that charm, but now the “1km” pendant itself is available for purchase for any cyclist who wants to keep a bike close to their heart. Many thanks to Tess for her bright idea!

Please click on the photo and it will take you to the store

There are two designs available to choose from now and more styles will be added as the months go by. If you would like a ‘good luck’ talisman to hang ’round your neck and kiss like the pros as you cross your personal finish line, these will do nicely. Soon there will be more news of big bike shop murals and Bike Scribble jerseys so please stay tuned!

I don’t think they mean bicyclists

A girl really should hop on the back of a motorcycle more than once every five years but every five years is better than nothin’! Today, when I got a chance to ride to Durango with my friend’s boyfriend on the back of his Suzuki Vstrom it broke the 5 year drought.

Born to be Wild.

Skimming along the surface of the earth as a passenger exposed to the elements gives a better perspective than as someone at the handlebars or the wheel. In the sparsely populated southwest you can easily see the upheavals of the eons and with much more clarity. One gets the sense that we were indeed strangers here once upon a time, deposited on the surface many thousands of years ago. Perhaps as explorers, perhaps as refugees. We learned to adapt and then to dominate – to our own detriment. It’s the prerogative of the Earth whether to embrace us or not, not the other way around. Gliding along at 75 mph, protected merely by some clothing and a helmet one becomes aware of one’s own fragility in the landscape. The forest and the cliffs couldn’t care less if I go splat. Our lesson, I believe is to learn how to respect Her and live harmoniously with the landscape and each other. We are obliged to behave as guests of our gracious host who has endured us these many thousands of years.

Of course, we are free to build more fiery chariots and bug the hell off to harass any other blue planet we are fortunate enough to find. However, if we try Her patience too long, she will simply rid herself of us by becoming inhospitable.

As I pass Lookout Point on Mesa Verde, renown site of vast Native American ruins, it’s easy to imagine the Anasazi performing ceremonies on it’s cliff tops. It makes me wonder how many generations it took for us to forget where we came from. Did our ancestors genetically engineer their offspring with whatever Cro-Magnon or Neanderthal species Earth’s evolution had produced at the time? Earth’s elements are now what make up my existence and all human kind, but the Earth is not a birthright, it is a gift that appeared as a jewel in the blackness of space millenia ago and innocently welcomed weary travelers. Along with the memory of my extra-terrestrial origins I have also lost the ability to imagine any home more beautiful than this.

Ramblings from the lunatic fringe to be sure. Many others have expressed these theories before and far better than I. But these are the things you think about on your first vacation in years while going 75 mph on the back of a motorcycle down hwy 160 in southwestern Colorado.

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