The Cradle Loop & the Houndstooth Ghosts
It was just another Winter's day
eddy is an old soul who has taken root deep in the frame of my yellow Eddy Merckx Alumega. He’s been there for years now, silent witness, occasional wiseass, & steady companion on the road. The bike itself is magnificent: that classic yellow, the way it hums when we’re in rhythm. Sometimes I mediate, sometimes he does. Mostly we just crank the cradle & talk about everything & nothing.
One ordinary morning I woke up, stretched, & told him straight: “eddy, I really miss my houndstooth & vintage tweed jackets. They don’t fit me anymore. I passed them on.”
eddy didn’t miss a beat. “Well,” he said, “you should get some more. And while you’re at it, cycle more. Be less portly.”
I laughed. “I think I will. You know, eddy, I had those jackets before I met Kath.”
“That makes them vintage, old man.”
“If I’m old, what are you?”
“I’m a fossil,” he replied, dry as dust.
I smiled at the memory. “I think Kath found me dapper in those jackets. I looked the part, the sophisticated gentleman.”
I swear I saw eddy smirk through his handlebars.
Just then the Dutch girl chimed in from her place on the wall. Donald had bought her on a trip to Holland in the fifties as a gift for Marguerite. She (similar in name to Kath’s second name which was Margaret) had left her to my mom who was her niece, & now she watches over my bedroom. I started calling her Marilyn because “the Dutch girl” felt too cold, & she happily accepted the name.
“Well yes,” Marilyn said, “Donald bought the same jackets from John Orrs. That place was the best. Pity we don’t have the classic old department stores like that anymore.”
“Modern society has destroyed some good things,” both eddy & Marilyn agreed in unison.
“Find another jacket then,” Marilyn suggested.
“I’ve looked,” I told her. “They don’t sell them anymore. The shops are filled with rubbish. The fashion is… blah.”
So that weekend eddy & I went to do the loop at the Cradle. We had a great crank. The moon hung visible in the morning sky, the clouds painted like something out of a Joni Mitchell song, soft, drifting, full of quiet longing.
eddy went quiet as we flew past the caves. I could sense him having a short conversation with something older than both of us, joining what sounded like a bird-like meditation. I asked what he was doing.
“Shh. We’re worshipping.”
“The moon?”
“Yes.”
“Why during the day & not at night?”
“You really asking me such a dumb question?” he shot back.
“Fair enough,” I said, and left him to his chants.
I was still puzzled by the day-and-night moon worship as we sweated up the last hill & wheeled into Biden. There was a market on. “Listen eddy,” I said, “I feel like some biltong. I’ll load you in the car & go find some.”
No biltong at the market. But there was a stall with vintage clothing. The owner said he imported bales from Australia. I dug through and found a couple of good jackets, proper ones, with character. He gave me a discount for taking two.
When I got back to the car I told eddy the news: no biltong, but jackets acquired.
“Awesome,” he said. Then, with that fossil superiority, “I used to have the best biltong made in the caves. Better than your stuff.”
“Yes, eddy.”
Back home I showed Marilyn the jackets.
“As handsome as Donald,” she declared.
Donald was Marguerite’s husband, the one who’d bought her the Dutch girl painting all those decades ago. The thread of existence runs through everything, jackets, paintings, bicycles, memories, people long gone but somehow still here.
“Thanks, Marilyn.” I turned to eddy. “See? Be nice.”
eddy just sighed.
Some days the road gives you more than kilometres. It gives you back pieces of yourself you thought you’d lost, a houndstooth memory, a yellow bike with an ancient soul, a Dutch girl on the wall who still approves.
And somewhere between the Cradle’s caves & the morning moon, you remember: the sophisticated gentleman never really left. He just needed a new jacket & a good crank to find his way home again.
Somewhere in the four corners of the earth, there is a resounding laugh and comforting giggle from Kathleen (Kath) & she would appreciate the houndstooth coming back. In reality she is gone, but also she is still a presence. Like all, who have existed. Winter’s tale.