Buzzing

Being retired makes you feel a little funny. Most of the time it feels like a big relief, some of the time it makes you feel a little old and out of touch. Tonight it's feeling a little like both. But when we were walking back from dinner I was just appreciating being around for a nice summer evening. We're in Illinois now in a town called Canton, and it's warm and balmy and green turning to dark green as the sun goes down. The fireflies are out en masse, doing their thing as they light up and then disappear. When you get east of the Missouri river the cicadas start up every night, for awhile going strong, then like Hitler's parade marchers, they all stop at once like they've been ordered to. Cicadas are called locusts by some, but they are not related to them, as a locust is a form of grasshopper. The name comes from the exact Latin word cicada meaning buzzer. Those Italians could really come up with a good description. Canton is a 40 mile ride from Galesburg, on easy country roads that are full of 10ft. corn and 3ft. high soybeans. All is green, except for the occasional helmet sized mushroom, the riding is superb. We are next to the Illinois river, which looks brown for a reason. Peoria is upriver and dumps raw sewage into it 25 times a year! We didn't swim. It only took us about 3hrs to ride the 40 miles, and we had the scare of our lives along the way. Coming up on an intersection out in the country, we were minding our own business and did not have a stop sign. The intersecting road did, but little could we tell that a utility truck was blocking the sign from the view of a car from the left. He blew through the intersection at about 60mph, and I only saw him in time to slam on our brakes and turn right as hard as I could. We differ some on how much he missed us by, Laura says 5ft. I say about 6. The adrenaline kicked in about 30 seconds later, and we just about fainted. He didn't stop, just tapped his brakes like he thought he had seen something unusual. So I can't help appreciating how the cicadas sound and how nice the evening is. You never really know when it will be your last. I just retired, I want to be around for awhile. Canton was named by it's founder because he thought it was the antipode for Canton, China. He was mistaken, the antipode for this town is in the Indian ocean. An antipode is the point opposite you on the globe if you draw a straight line through the center of the earth. If you dug a deep hole here, you wouldn't be in China. But in 1825 when this town was founded, they didn't have GPS. We stopped at a museum today in Knoxville, and looked at a buggy Lincoln used, as well as other things from the era. There will be much more on further blogs about him I'm sure, he's big down here. Tomorrow we will ride about 60 miles to Petersburg, leaving early to try to beat the heat and humidity. Our legs are fairly used up, but the terrain is flat here in Illinois and it is really good riding. The bike is working well, although the load in the yellow box on the back seems to get heavier and heavier all the time. Sometime during the 6 hours of riding tomorrow I am going to try to hum like a cicada.