Messenger bike.

I spent the weekend in Pagosa Springs, Colorado with some friends just for a relaxing getaway. It was lovely.

We stayed in a bed and breakfast, which I had never done before, but very much enjoyed. I had the thought that it would be fun to own one myself someday... that is, if it weren't so impractical.

We stopped at several gift shops. At one in particular, the woman who sold her hand-made crafts was having a huge sale to celebrate staying in business for 8 years. I admired her commitment to her passion, especially because the things she sold were just trinkets that didn't serve any real purpose.

We spent a couple hours soaking in the hot springs. In one such pool, we talked to a man who was telling us all about his trip to New Zealand and how he and his family had taken a self-guided tour of a bunch of the places that the Lord of the Rings trilogy was filmed. As he described in detail how much fun it was, I thought about how expensive it must have been, and right then and there resigned myself to the fact that I'd most likely never get to see it for myself.

And then...

As we stopped off the side of the road to take some scenic pictures the next day, another car had parked 50 feet or so away from us. Two men got out of the car and began unloading their road biking gear. As we looked around at the scenery, I turned around in time to see the two men on their bikes begin climbing the fairly steep road up the canyon. I smiled and called out, "you're braver souls than I!"

One biker man smiled and called back out, still pedaling, "You could do it too!"

I snorted and countered, "Yeah right! In my dreams."

Then the biker, almost out of earshot, called out without looking back, "So dream!"

... He couldn't have said anything more appropriate if it had been scripted.

I spent the rest of the trip thinking about how any virtue taken to an extreme can become a vice... including practicality.