Generous Strangers, again

Post for 29-30 June 2021

In 2018, one stranger told me to bring a gun after I told him I was planning a ride across the US. That stranger was my insurance agent. Maybe his work makes him think about risk too much. Around 2019, I saw a posting on Facebook from a guy who was going on his first bike tour. His gear included brass knuckles, a pistol, and a knife made more for combat than camping. I replied that instead of carrying all that heavy gear, I wanted to bring little gifts for the generous strangers that always show up.

Generous strangers show up so often that we have a name for them. In bike-touring and through-hiking, they’re called trail angels. For folks who paddle for 100s or 1,000s of miles, they’re called water angels. Of course, there are bad people in the world, always have been, but they get far too much attention.

Scott, me, and my bike in front of the lovely home he let me stay in.

In this post, I’m showing some generous strangers since a few showed up on June 29-30. The song for today is Old Friends by Guy Clark. I’m certain the generous strangers I met have many old friends because they have kind hearts and take a chance on sharing some generosity. This song is also for my old friends, like Carrie, Simon, Tomoko, Karl, Aimee, and Abbott.

There’s only one map showing my route since I took a day off on June 30, to give my legs a rest. I stayed at the home of my new friend Scott, one of the generous strangers in the pictures.