Scratch Cycles

  I landed in Salt Lake City on Wednesday evening and called a car to get out to Park City as soon as possible. I got to the house my coworkers and I rented for the long weekend to find it freshly stocked with 96 beers and an assortment of breakfast foods, snacks, and a bottle of High West whiskey. Only 2 of the other 11 guys had arrived so far, but we figured that in order to make the most of the weekend, we had to get started right away. We cracked open the bottle of whiskey and got to drinking.  An hour and three glasses later, the three of us walked up to High West's saloon on Main St to meet up with another guy for dinner. I got my first taste of historic Park City, walking past wood sided houses that likely built in the silver rush era interspersed with modern homes designed to look like they might have been built back then.  One stuck out to me. It was in the process of being remodeled. The wood was rotting and crumbling in places. The back half of the roof was mis...

Heads up: If you know Brian O'Donnell, this might be tough to read. In the past three years, I’ve answered a lot of questions from friends and family about my current living situation. I can give reasonable answers to these questions, but if I’m honest they’re not always fully truthful because I struggle to explain the emotions and feelings that make those questions not even make a ton of sense to me.  By far the hardest feeling to communicate to people is that my nomadic lifestyle doesn’t feel unstable. To me, this feels like the most stability I’ve ever had. No matter what happens, or where I wake up, or what city I’m in, I have everything I need to face the day packed in a backpack or the side cases of my motorcycle. It is a smaller core to base my life around, but I think a much stronger one.  The world has inherent instability, and establishing roots in withering soil feels more like being subsumed into the chaotic unpredictability of life than an expansion of solid found...