I needed a creativity outlet, so here! Read this. The picture is of me teaching my little girl to ride her bike. Her pink bike, pink helmet, pink tutu, and pink cowgirl boots kept her especially safe! I skateboarded beside her for moral support, and to hitch a ride which she didn't appreciate!
For the last 15 years, I have been stuck at a desk, in a cubicle farm, under florescent lights, staring at a computer, making largely important, but boring phone calls. I am not designed for that. I feel like like a lion locked in a cage.... I am an outside person, a creative person, and I need an outlet. This outlet was supposed to be my scuba instructor job. I was ripped off by a TPD Police Officer for my whole certification fee of 2k, so that didn't happen. I went through training from Advanced to Instructor, and then had to deploy while I was waiting for my certification cards to arrive at the shop. I was patient as I wasn't able to "dive right in" to instructing anyways. I came back from that deployment, to only have to deploy again 4 months later to the same country. That deployment was 14 months long. I was trying to contact the shop to ask about my cards, and the shop was sold while I was gone. It's a shame, I really liked him but in the end he did the wrong thing. There was no record of me at all with the new shop owners so I was tossed in the trash. The police officer was no longer current in his certification, so I got the big "OH WELL! SUCKS TO BE YOU" routine.
I have been struggling with life as I NEED to build something. Not like a bird house, but something bigger, like a huge company. This was then shaping up to be a sailboat towing business. I had a beautiful dually, a black F350 on semi-truck wheels, with all the power to tow a beautiful sailboat trailer capable of handling a 45 ft sailboat. There was only one thing that stood in my way, surplus capital. So close. I needed to pay my bills while I got the company off the ground. My creativity was flowing and then splat, back to work at a desk job for someone else. Years go by.
I injure my back a little at a time, until the pain in unbearable. The spinal fusion I had in 2017 was a success, but left me in a real bind. I had to heal in 3 months to be able to deploy, which I did. My combat fitness test score only suffered a little which was surprising because I thought I was going to break my back all the way after just learning to walk again. While I was deployed, I worked out hard in the gym several hours a day. All weights and no mobility training. My back hurt and my left hip hurt. BAD! I didn't want to stretch. It just hurt, so without knowing it, I made it hurt worse by building bigger and tighter muscles all around it. My running was obsolete at this point. Every impact was a huge jar right around my scar on my lower back. I bought a bicycle just before that last deployment and came back home with some major bike rides in mind. The longer I rode, the more I saw, and fell deeper in love with my beautiful state. The routes I began to plan in 2017 were day trips all around the Tampa, St Pete, Ana Maria Island area, but i wanted more.
In 2018, I started looking up ways to do multi-day trips. I then discovered "bikepacking", which involves packing camping gear on your bike. I started watching YouTube videos about the subject and going through all my past military and camping gear, trying to whittle it down to what was absolutely necessary, and I am still not happy with it. Will I ever be? On the bright side, I do have a single shot espresso maker though!!!
For Christmas 2019, I asked for the bags and hung them on my bike. My first bikepacking trip was riding the train from Tampa to West Palm Beach, then cycling back to Venice for a total of 189 miles. I didn't sleep one wink. See the next blog post for that trip. My creativity dam had a crack, and a trickle was formed for my much needed creative outlet. Planning, organizing, advertising, conducting, and following up on group rides was the perfect venue for my talents. I am a Florida Native, from Central Florida. I grew up in Lakeland, so I was really central. 4 hours to Tally, 4 to Miami (My-amma). About an hour to Tampa or Orlando. I saw a lot of Florida and Georgia growing up, but I know there is a lot more to see.
I came up with "Natiive" with two ii's to distinguish the name of this group from brands of Native (eye wear, shoes, deodorant, and kayaks). For anyone who is still reading this and interested in continuing on with the trip blogs, there will be an advertisement for upcoming trips, followed by a blog post summarizing the trip and links to all the media captured during the ride, so go check those out. Videos will be uploaded to the YouTube channel when I get better at developing those, and I will be conducting interviews and capturing interesting content for those, as well as podcasts. There will also be a Facebook page for chatting about future rides and coordinating that way. Hopefully, they all play nice and we can have safe and fun rides seeing Florida like a Natiive.
Ride on,
Duane C Stamm
Natiive Cycler
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