Venice Adrift
By: Gilbert Ramirez
Tags: Cycling, 80s, California, Los Angeles, Short Story

Photo Credit: Unknown

Descending Tuna Canyon Road on a bike is like floating down a torrent. Few vehicles use it because there’s nothing to go to, nothing to see, except the terrain. The uncertain road is a seven-mile mosaic of rocky debris from above, blind curves, and patchwork from previous washouts. Collectively, they prevent me from hitting top speed and cutting smooth lines. It’s a single lane that drops 2500 ft as it snakes along the mountainside — too steep for artificial structures and too unstable for trees to take root; in some spots, it projects out over the side of a cliff. There are no side streets or turn-offs; even drivers with time-to-kill prefer the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH). Because of my path of approach, I only occasionally get a glimpse of the water as I descend to the sea. I’m alone.

“Beauty I’d always missed

With these eyes before”

Tuna’s one of those poorly maintained roads where your brakes aren’t going to save you if you get in over your head. I’m confident, but I don’t test my handling skills on the lower sections because the drop-offs are steep — maybe a hundred feet. The sun is vanishing into the infinity skyline. After six hours on the bike, the saline patina — from sweat or the sea air — at the corners of my mouth slakes my dehydration. Usually, I’m more aggressive, but today — now — I’m at peace. “Nights in White Satin,” in my Walkman, helped me to take in the elements.

“Some try to tell me, thoughts they cannot defend”

It’s near dark when I hit the PCH, the false barrier that skirts between rugged mountains and the enigmatic ocean. The moment I drop in from the canyon, I revert to the modern world, a sea of red taillights at a standstill. If I had the energy, I could get to Santa Monica by riding back up to Mulholland; but, it’s too dangerous at night. My fault; I bit off more than I can chew. Now, after baking in the sun for ninety miles and several mountain passes, I’m cooked — fried. I hate riding the shoulder of the highway south of Malibu, especially after dark, but it’s my only way back to Venice. Fortunately, I’ve hit the Sunday afternoon gridlock, sludging its way south after a weekend at a north coast.

The last ten miles of my ride are flat; the first few are a little dicey. I’m bordering on dehydration, but I have no choice but to keep laboring through my pedal stroke. All I can think about is ice-cold lime Gatorade as I effortlessly pass the vehicles in the “slow lanes.” Even with traffic stalled, there’s the fear of getting struck by a high-strung driver. After three anxious miles, I hit the northernmost tip of the cycle path to take me home along the coast. The second I leave the roadway, I’m overwhelmed with relief, and my fear adrenaline shuts down. No longer in survival mode, a wave of tranquility washes through me as I set off for the five remaining miles to Venice — without cars. With no more music, I’m left with just my thoughts.

“Letters I’ve written

Never meaning to send”

Did I mention it’s 1990? When I was twenty, I dropped out of college and moved out to Venice with a buddy from high school. We split an efficiency apartment on the beach. He pulled an internship at Frank Gehry while I expedited at TGI Fridays. I was also racing and writing, but that wasn’t going anywhere. Somehow, we made rent. For my long training rides, I tucked a few mixtapes and a Walkman in my jersey. Cassettes rarely held more than 75 minutes of music, so I’d rotate them during my ride. I usually listened to aggressive music — music to break myself to — but, on this day, I’d accidentally grabbed a tape of easy-listening music. And this is what I was listening to when I was drifting down from the mountains.

With my Walkman dead and me over my endurance limit, my senses come alive. The beach feels drastically different after the sun goes down. Without people, the force of the waves — wind tussling with water as they hit the sand — resounds through you. I can hear them, but with the absence of light, I can’t see them. There is nothing but darkness when I look out at sea. The night water meets the sky somewhere, but it all looks the same.

In Santa Monica, the cement bike path is set in from the road; it divides the sun-bleached beach, serpentining down the coast. It always has a layer of sand on it. Nearby, along the PCH, the light distortion from vehicles and streetlights plays with my vision — disorienting. All around me, I hear seagulls and pelicans fighting for scraps, but I can’t see them. I can taste the salt particles in the breeze from the incoming waves.

While I’m relaxed, I have to focus a little because I can’t always distinguish between the sand and the bike path. Veering off the latter would bring me to a complete halt very quickly. In the distance, I can see the Santa Monica pier. As I coast the coast, alone, hungry, in darkness, I’m euphoric. I’m proud — not only of my accomplishment but of how I’ve chosen to live. You can’t just wake up one day and ride a hundred miles of mountainous terrain. It’s moments like these that put me at peace but also in a heightened state of awareness. I think about where I’ve been. I think about where the world is going and what part I’ll play in it. Did I screw my life when I left school? Do I want a family? What is it all about?

Anaïs Nin once said: “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.”

Flat tires suck. When you get a flat tire one mile from home, the decision you must make is, do I fix it now or ride the flat home and fix it later. When you have a nice bike, you never ride on a flat tire.

You wouldn’t recognize the Venice Boardwalk and muscle beach at night. Without street performers, sidewalk artists, carnival barkers, and t-shirt kiosks, it feels like a slum. Vagrants and beach bums claim benches and hunker down for the evening with their cardboard mattresses and blankets. You learn to walk wide of anyone that might be arguing — with themself. Occasionally, you have to navigate through a stenchmosphere of urine. When I lived in Venice, I got to recognize some of the nightly “locals.” Most seemed harmless, but close encounters weren’t inviting.

“Why are you here?” the voice asked.

I’m leaning over, changing the tube on my front wheel, about a mile from my apartment, when I hear the voice. I’m near the boardwalk but on the bike path. All I want to do is fix my tire, get home, and eat — anything. I thought I was alone, so I’m a little startled when I hear the question. When I pivot to look at the unkempt man behind me, I realize that I recognize him. I don’t know him, but I’ve seen him in the area a few times.

“Pardon me?” I respond.

“You’re not from here. Why are you here?” he asks.

At this point, I don’t know if he’s asking me if I’m an American or why I’m on the bike path or something else. Aside from appearing disheveled, he looks amiable, but I feel vulnerable. Cycling shoes and lycra have a way of making me feel defenseless, if not a little…dainty. The last thing I want to do is further delay my return to my apartment. With a measured hint of dismissal, I answer, “Just fixin’ my tire.” Then I refocus on my wheel.

“You find what you were looking for?” he asks.

After a short chuckle, I reply, “Ummm, not looking for anything.”

“Need any help?” he continues.

I still feel peaceful, but I am getting a little annoyed by his questions. And I want him to know this. I purposely delay my response as I work. I just want to get back. Before I respond, he adds, “You ride a lot. I can see you’re busy. I’ll leave you alone.”

As he begins to scuff away, I realize he’s probably seen me — recognizes me being from the area. With my tire repaired, I start to pump air into it. For whatever reason, I consider that I’ve been kind of an ass, then ask, “You from around here?”

“You could say that,” he responds. “Where’d you ride to?”

I begin, “Went up to Mulholland, then cut into the mountains — down to Thousand Oaks, then back up — “

“Great roads,” he breaks in. “That why you’re here?”

Now I’m curious. This is the second time he’s asked me that question. I keep going with my hand pump and respond, “Not really. I’m trying to be a writer.”

He smiles. “Go figure — another artist in Venice,” he says.

As I finish with my wheel and put my pump back onto my bike, I respond, “Well, not yet. I don’t know if it will happen. We’ll see, I guess.” At this point, I’m ready to get back on my bike and ride the last mile back home, but the old man is friendly. The way he’s speaking, I consider that he may not be a vagrant. He might even be educated. It’s been a pleasant exchange, so I don’t immediately ride off.

“Mind if I ask how old you are?” he inquires.

I chuckle, “Twenty.”

“Don’t force it,” he shoots back. “You’re doing the right thing. No offense, but you don’t have anything to say yet. Just keep living. Before you know it, it will all be over.”

Now I’m intrigued. He doesn’t even know me. I’m a bit offended, but I don’t let on as much. “Are you a writer?” I ask.

Without answering my question, he responds, “Most people overestimate what they can do in a year and underestimate what they can do in three.”

“Okay,” I respond as a question.

He studies me for an awkward moment as he scratches his chin, then continues slowly, as though he’s trying to be dramatic, “There’s an element in the universe. It’s intangible, but it’s there, and it’s part of everything. It’s hidden under layers and layers of your preconceptions. Some people call it a God. For some, it’s money. For others, maybe a muse, or just hate.” After a short chuckle, he adds. “Yoda calls aether the force. It’s your ability to create what you want in the world.” And, with this, he turns and begins to walk off. “Have a good ride,” he says.

Somewhat confused and at a loss for anything to say, I reply quietly, “Have a nice evening.” In my head, I mumble, “What the hell?”

Without looking at me, the man says, “Believe what’s inside you. Just what you want to be, you will be in the end.”

When I returned to my apartment, I washed up quickly, then dug into some Friday’s leftovers — chicken marsala with a side of pasta Alfredo. I laid on my mattress in silence for a while in my recovery “coma” and watched the ocean breeze gently stir our sheer curtains back and forth. We didn’t have a TV, and this was “before” home computers.

I never saw the old man again. I didn’t look for him; I just noted that I never saw him. Soon after leaving Venice, I joined the military for six years. Then I bartended for another six as I went back to school. As my life evolved, I had no reason to think about the encounter — and I didn’t. It wasn’t until about twenty years later that I came across an article about electromagnetic forces, gravitational pull, and subatomic particles. I was wasting time on the Internet. Sure enough, there it was. And I recalled my encounter. Then, because it was so long ago, and because of my altered state that evening, I questioned whether it had even happened at all.

Today, a couple of songs have the power to immediately take me back to when I lived carefree on the beach, where I seemed to be more in tune with the elements all around me. When I hear one, I see myself objectively — from a bird’s eye view — effortlessly sailing down one of the mountain roads, occasionally getting a glimpse of the Pacific Ocean that no camera can capture. For this, I’m grateful. Before living on the beach, I’d never been to one at night. Now, I prefer it. And I’m thankful for all the time I wasted in Venice Adrift.

- GR