My Not So Triumphant Return From Phoenix — I Still Don't Know What I'm Doing

Back to the story. So I narrowly escaped ruin in Phoenix and moved back to Gunnison and my love. Life was good again. Now it was time to celebrate and get on with what I was supposed to do with my life right? Not quite yet. In my last few months in Phoenix I had decided to race a motocross race. Sounds like a great idea right. I mean I had raced a few off-road races and been spending time on a track so what could happen? UGH!!

Let me set the stage here. It’s the week before the race, I was out at the track with friends practicing. I was still a relative NEWB on a bike. It is 2004 and I have owned a dirt bike for all of 2 years. I was in pretty decent shape but I was riding a completely stock WR250F, headlight and all. My buddies were giving me pointers and telling me how to go faster. There was this gnarly 10 pack of doubles (for you non-moto people that means that there are 10 bumps that you jump 2 at a time) that I have been rolling (not jumping 2 at a time) all day. I finally screwed up the courage to jump into these things and I immediately lost control and waded the bike up bad. Classic Morgan by the way. I hit the ground hard and got up dazed. No big deal, I kicked the bike to life again and finished the lap. As I pulled off I noticed that my left wrist hurts pretty bad but it must just be jammed. I raced the next weekend and went on with my life, wrist hurting but I was managing.

Fast forward back to being home in Gunni. Ruth in her love and amazing awesomeness had purchased us 2 tickets to Costa Rica as a graduation present for me and a re-connection time for us. We were so stoked to get out of Gunni (It was winter when I graduated) and spend some time together. But I had this nagging pain in my wrist still. I figured I would get it checked out real fast before we left to make sure everything was OK. I will remember that doctor’s visit for the rest of my life. We scheduled the appointment and headed to the orthopedic doc to get checked out. She schedules an x-ray and we wait. When she came back in the room she had this look on her face, I knew it wasn’t good. She explained that my wrist was NOT ok and that I had broken the scaphoid bone in my crash. “Ok doc, its been about 3 months since I had the crash, is it healed up yet” I said with my signature hopeful yet ignorant tone. “No, you need to have surgery very soon if you want to fix that bone” she replied. What??? I have been working and riding for 3 months and it hurts but not that bad. She went on to explain lots of doctory things and this and that and convinced us that I needed surgery right away. The surgery and time down wasn’t the really bad part, it meant that we weren’t going to Costa Rica. I was going to be under the knife and then healing while we were supposed to be soaking up sun and catching tubular waves.

I could see the disappointment in Ruth’s face and I wanted so badly to take it all back. I wanted to go back in time and not race, not ride motocross. Heck I even wanted to take all of Phoenix back at that moment. This was one of what became many (unfortunately) times that my selfishness had resulted in pain for my wife and our life. I know it sounds like it was just an accident but it was more of a symbol of how I had decided to do what I wanted to do and it cost us a time of doing something that Ruth really wanted to do. Of course I wanted to go on the trip too so it was really a double kick in the gut.

The injury and following surgery did have a bright side. Since we couldn’t leave the country and go surfing with my wrist, we changed plans and went on a road trip. A road trip that would forever change another small part of our lives. It was a week long trip and lots of nice things happened but the important moment came in Bisbee Arizona. Quick aside, if you haven’t been to Bisbee, you need to go. It is a funky little old mining town on the boarder of AZ and Mexico that has turned into an artist community but still has a working mine in the middle of it. The juxtaposition is really interesting and funny. Anyway, we were walking through Bisbee and this long haired hippy looking dude offered us a free espresso. Yeah, that’s as weird as it sounds but somehow fits right into Bisbee. At the time we “liked” coffee (our obsession knows no bounds now) so we said “Sure.” Seth handed us the espresso and it was amazing. We decided to buy some beans and said “thanks” and headed out. We still get coffee from Seth at Old Bisbee Coffee Roasters today and it is still the best I have found! I know that doesn’t make up for me ruining a Costa Rican vacation but the coffee IS really good!

Thanks again for reading along as I share my story. Like always if you feel inclined, like, share or comment below. If you want to get a hold of me directly you can email me at morgan@highland-cycles.com or follow me on the Twitter bands at @tmospradling

Have a great day and remember to write down 3 things you are grateful for today. Here are my 3: Central heat that works well, My amazing and beautiful wife, and my 2 wonderful boys. See, that isn’t hard! Peace out!

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