The view from my hotel window at 6:00 on Sunday morning was not encouraging, nor was the radar image on my phone’s weather app. A rather large, albeit not severe, storm system was moving into the area from the northwest. With a few hours remaining until I would head for Lake Geneva for the combined Chicagoland and Wisconsin Ride for Kids, or not, I kept checking the radar and looking out my window as the system rolled in.

Within an hour, my friend Ann had messaged me her regrets. It was already pouring rain and thundering by her, so she opted out of joining me for the ride. I agreed with Ann’s decision 100%, though I’d by lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed.

A little while after that,the rain arrived in Kenosha, too. I decided to go downstairs, load a few things onto the bike, grab some breakfast and see what the weather was going to do. And what it did was get very, very wet in short order.

But then a funny thing happened. By the time I walked out of the breakfast room, it had stopped raining. I walked outside, just to make sure my eyes hadn’t been playing tricks on me. The pavement was still quite wet, but there was not a drop of rain falling any more. I checked the time. It was just after 9:00, still plenty of time to pack up, check out, and head for Lake Geneva. So that’s exactly what I did.

I had donned my rain gear as a precaution. The rain was gone and the sun was beginning to peek out from behind the dissipating cloud cover, but there was still plenty of spray being kicked up from the wet road surface—at least until the road dried out, which happened surprisingly quickly, thanks in part to the plentiful gusting wind.

As I pulled into the Grand Geneva Resort, I couldn’t wait to get out of that rain suit and put on some sunscreen. The wind was still whipping, but the day had become sunny and dry. Unfortunately the damage had already been done with regard to attendance. I have been participating in the Chicagoland event since 2003 and this was by far the least attended of any to which I have been—and the donations collected reflected this as well. But those of us who were there managed to have a good time and came away with the satisfaction of knowing that we helped the kids. In the end, that’s what matters most.

As always, thanks for hanging with me.