With snow falling around me, I thought ahead to my 30th birthday. It would arrive in mid-May when the snow had long melted. Other than the waning seasons, there wasn’t much else I expected to change when the day comes and goes. Certainly no more momentous than the 29 earlier.

Then comes my friend Django, who mentioned a trip to Moab he would be going on. It was a motorcycle adventure, the kind you fantasize about as a kid. Surviving off what you can carry on your bike, changing flat tires while the sun expires, the smell of gasoline and campfire permeating your gear. On a whim, I asked if I could go.

We’ll get to the trip shortly. First, I had a much more important task: I needed to learn how to ride a motorcycle.

At twelve weeks before taking off for the desert I sat on my first bike, a 2001 Suzuki DR200. It’s white and blue with no effort dedicated to anything but moving and stopping. For those wondering, I asked the same question, what does 200 mean? It means the engine has 200cc of displacement, or simplified, how much the bike goes vroom. Your typical Harley might have anywhere from 800cc-1200cc. So I thought this would be a piece of cake.