Leaning into Life: Lessons from the Road

Please join me as I launch Live Full Throttle: Life Lessons From Friends Who Faced Cancer.

• When: Wednesday, December 7, 2011 from 5-7pm
• Where: 300 East Tremont Ave Charlotte, NC 28203 Dilworth Billiards

After riding my motorcycle through 25+ states with a pink bra strapped across the windshield for breast cancer causes, I’ve collected a lot of wit and wisdom about life from friends who faced cancer.

Drop by Dilworth Billiards any time from 5-7 to hear some of my friends’ stories. I’ll run slides from this year’s roadtrip on the wall and bring plenty of copies of the book.

Napoliltano’s will be there with Italian fare like paninis, pasta fagioli, minestrone and tuscan white bean soups, and chocolate ravioli for dessert.

If the weather permits, hang out around the koi pond in the courtyard or stay indoors and pick up a cue stick. Dilworth Billiards has been a great supporter, having hosted Think-Drink-Eat-Pink before I left for this year’s roadtrip.

I’d love to see you, whether you buy a book or just come to wish me well. Nothing formal; leave your tiara at home but bring a friend or co-worker.

Revzilla is a great motorcycle gear company that is running a generous contest for a $500 gift certificate. HURRY: 10/30/11 deadline!

Live Full Throttle: Life Lessons From Friends Who Faced Cancer should be off the printing press in January, 2012.

Here’s a preview of the cover, introduction and first chapter…just scroll through.

After hearing hundreds of stories from women facing the ultimate sink hole –death–and doing it with grace, humor, moxie and joy, I decided to share what they taught me about life.

Live Full Throttle: Life Lessons From Friends Who Faced Cancer includes 100+ pages of full-color photographs along with essays and exercises. It will be off the printing press in January, 2012.

You can pre-order this $25 book today and receive free shipping and handling, a personalized message by me, and I’ll even pick up the sales tax if it applies. A portion of the proceeds will benefit cancer causes.

Route 66, “America’s Highway” runs parallel to I-40 from time to time, but not all the way through. Dusty and I took it for several stretches from New Mexico to California.

Winslow, Arizona

There are plenty of photo opps in the tourist traps that dot the old highway.  Winslow, Arizona ran with the Eagles song  “Take it Easy” to make its kitschey mark — and I fell for it! For those of you too young to remember, or whose taste in music has led you astray, the pertinent line says:

“Well I’m a standin’ on the corner in Winslow, Arizona and such a fine sight to see. It’s a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford slowin’ down to take a look at me…”

This photo now has a place ensconced in a Route 66 frame. After all, what’s life without some kitsch? Hats off to Dusty for setting up the shot and capturing the moment.

Oatman, Arizona

We lost more than a day from our planned schedule in the convection oven of the Southwest. From Texas through the Mojave Desert, temps were well over 100 and the winds surged at over 40mph.  Thankfully I had a hydration vest that kept me comfortable — submerge it in water and it works like a swamp cooler as you roll down the road.

In spite of losing so much time I was determined to visit Oatman, Arizona and Dusty humored me in spite of the long day already behind us by the time we approached Oatman (God love her!).

Formerly a gold mining town, Oatman is now a tourist destination thanks to Route 66 nostalgia and the wild burros that roam its streets. The burros are descended from pack animals turned loose by early prospectors, and are protected by the US Department of the Interior. You can set your watch by their 5pm departure from Main Street to the surrounding hills.

Dusty and I had a couple of apples in a cooler and we brought them out for photo opps. Only later did I learn that donkeys don’t digest them as easily as horses — it gives them diarrhea. Sorry!

As an adventure rider I have to note that the road to Oatman has wonderful twisties. Some day I’ll go back and take them at speed.

Travel always teaches me a lot about myself and the world. Here are the top 25 takeaways from my 2011 road trip.

1. Avoid fussy fabrics

2. Sip water constantly for perspiration instead of pee

3. 99% of strangers will help you in a pinch

4. An apple beats a bag of chips (on many levels)

5. Elk often rest in high grass — look for antlers above the grass

6. Wind can blow your bike over; don’t park broadside

7. Floodwaters stink after a few weeks

8. Always carry a camera

9.  Recharge — yourself and your electronics

10. Pink looks good on everyone

11. Even the Mississippi River starts out small

12. Start every morning with yoga and thanks to The One

13.  Life is full of blind corners

14. Pack your warmest sleeping bag

15. Leave some of yourself to the imagination of others

Because breast cancer strikes one in eight women

16. You get when you give

17. Everything wobbles, but not every wobble becomes a fall

18. Clothes can double as a pillow

19. Canadian customs will confiscate your pepper spray

20. Donkeys look like horses, but apples give them diarrhea

21. Rethink souvenirs

22. Bless the detours

23. A news holiday is good mental hygiene

24. Turn your ABS off when going off road

25. Campground squirrels are fearless thieves

This squirrel took our watermelon and stashed it in the tree