Bucket-List Dream, Ticked

The Tour de France had been on his list for twelve years. Not a casual interest — a specific, dated entry in a notebook he kept for things he intended to do before circumstances made them impossible. See the Tour. On a mountain. In person.

The notebook had other entries. Some were ticked. Some had been revised downward. The Tour remained in its original form, uncompleted, growing heavier with each July he spent watching on television.

He booked without researching alternatives. A friend had done a Mummu trip the previous year and the recommendation was delivered with the economy of someone who doesn't waste words on things that weren't good. "Book it. You won't regret it."

The mountain stage was the Tourmalet. He had pictured himself there many times — standing on the side of the road as the peloton climbed past, close enough to hear the gears. The reality matched the picture, which almost never happens with things you've imagined for over a decade.

The riders came through in a group that had been large at the base and was shrinking by the metre. The gradient did the selecting. He watched the yellow jersey's cadence — smooth, rhythmic, almost mechanical — and compared it to the riders around him, who were pedalling with the visible effort of people at their limit.

The moment lasted perhaps ninety seconds. The group passed, the team cars followed, and the road returned to the spectators who would spend the next thirty minutes walking back down to the buses.

That evening, at the hotel, he opened the notebook on his phone. He ticked the entry. Twelve years of intention resolved in ninety seconds of proximity.

The notebook still has uncompleted entries. But the one that mattered most — the one that had been there longest, growing heavier each year — is done.

He's already looking at next year's route. Not for the list. Just because he wants to go back.