everything’s ready. still haven’t gone.

location: reservoir edge. car pointed at the water like that counts. conditions: still, warm, a few strangers existing quietly in my peripheral vision. energy level: stuck in neutral. nothing wrong, nothing moving.

the board is inflated. the gear is packed. the water is calm. the day is open.

i am not scared of the paddling part. i am stuck on the part where i walk past people alone, carrying a board that looks bigger than i am, then push off and keep being alone where everyone can see it.

if there were a dock, i’d already be gone. if someone said “let’s go,” i would’ve.

there is a specific kind of paralysis that only happens when everything is ready and the only thing left is to actually do it. i have been sitting in it for forty-five minutes.

the small obsessions

i bought onx backcountry, not for the trails — though it handles those too — but for the edges. property lines. public water access. where it’s okay to walk in with a board and where it’s technically someone’s lawn and they will absolutely come out and tell you about it.

also to track paddles. to make little digital lines on a map that prove i did, in fact, move my body through space on purpose. i am apparently motivated by evidence.

what actually happened

stayed parked. scrolled maps. identified seventeen places i could theoretically paddle and did not paddle at any of them. the reservoir made its ambient reservoir sounds. i ate a granola bar and took notes instead of taking the board out, which is either self-awareness or a character flaw and i’m not ready to decide which.

tiny adjustments

walk past the people anyway. they are not watching. and if they are, they will forget in thirty seconds because they have their own granola bars and their own paralysis and their own boards sitting in their own car.

“alone” is not the problem. alone is the point. i went outside because i wanted quiet, and quiet is what happens when you stop waiting for someone to come with you.

tomorrow: same reservoir, same board, fewer excuses, same granola bar because it was actually pretty good.

field note filed: today i wrote about paddling instead of paddling. tomorrow, ideally, i do both.