Thank you

John, a stranger who hosted me, showed me kindness as I attempted one of the most physically challenging journeys of my life.

This is John. John and his wife were strangers to me when I arrived at their home in mid-Wales in June 2021. I was attempting to cycle the length of the UK solo, off road and the route went past their home.

I found John on the website Warm Showers, a community site for cycle tourers all over the world to host each other, a sharing economy, if economy is the right word. We were only just out of a COVID lock-down so the offer was to camp for free in their beautiful garden. It was a hot, sunny summer so we spent the evening outside talking.

John had taken early retirement in his 50s. He told me that when he retired he was so unfit from a lifetime of dedication to a desk-job that he could hardly walk up the hill behind his house. He realised that if he didn't do something about it he wouldn't have much of a retirement to enjoy. John got in to cycling, then running. A friend pointed out that if he got into swimming too he could do a triathlon. John got into triathlons and, after a while, decided to go for the big one - an Iron Man triathlon, famous for being the ultimate test of endurance. He successfully completed his first Iron Man at the age of 65. He had a big red M tattooed on his right calf. First Iron Man, first tattoo.

John made quite the impression on me as we sat and talked in his garden that whole summer evening. I was physically drained from the ride I was doing and left wishing I could have given more to the interaction.

It’s been on my reminders list ever since then to send a thank you to John, nearly three years on the To Do list.

Last weekend I was on my bike again and my route went past his home. I stopped, knocked on the door and waited, no answer. I was about to get back on my bike when I saw a woman coming down the road, I recognised her as John’s wife.

I reminded her that she and John had hosted me nearly three years ago and told her that it’s been on my To Do list to send a proper thank you since then. I asked her to pass a message on to John. She told me John had passed away, less than a year after I stayed with them. Cancer.

All this time I’d thought about sending him a message. In my mind, over the last three years, he was still full of life, doing his triathlons, being kind to strange cyclists. All that time it had never been quite important enough to turn my sentiment into a thank you.

I thought about it the rest of the weekend as I rode my bike through the stunning, empty mountains of mid-Wales. On the drive back to Bristol, the thoughts started to take shape. I wrote this in memory of John:

Thank you

How many thank yous lay within us

Waiting for a quiet moment

To rise up

Like a dust mote in a warm ray of sun

To remind us of a kindness

Something someone did for us once

We sit and watch the thought, feel the warmth of the memory, then watch it settle back down to wait for the next quiet moment

These thank yous lay dormant, waiting for a cool evening, or a quiet Sunday morning

Rarely do we turn these internal experiences into external expressions

Rarely so we reach out and ruffle the steady, sometimes stagnant waters of normality

And then it’s too late. The person, that someone that did something for us, leaves this world

But we all do it, and there’s comfort in that. To think of all the people that might be sat at their kitchen table on a quiet Sunday morning thinking of that something we did for them once

A constellation of people sat in quiet moments, in warm memories, thinking of someone, and the kindness they showed us