Talking with Strangers.

Q: How do you know when there’s a single speeder at a party.
A: They’ll tell you.

Dean Anderson

I’m not a shy guy by any stretch of the imagination but would still consider myself somewhat introverted. I spend a lot of my free time alone working on the podcast, creating music and of course riding bikes.

Last night I had the pleasure of chatting with Ty Domin (@tydomin). I’ve been trying to connect with Ty for quite some time now, primarily to talk about single speed bikepack racing, but I really just wanted to chat. From the interactions we’ve had on social and by his posts, he seemed like a good dude and that he’d be fun to talk to. The next two hours were a blast filled with stories, life ambitions and a lot of laughs. Make sure you don’t miss that conversation. Subscribe now and stay tuned.

While we were talking I was thinking “What a world we live in!” As a child I can recall conversations with grandma where we spent 20 minutes yelling into our respective mouthpieces in an attempt to amplify the signal so we could hear one another. Grandma only lived 2 hours away. Skip ahead almost 40 years and now we’re talking face to face from opposites sides of the marble we inhabit on wafer thin discreet devices that fit in our pockets and have immensely more computational power than NASA had to send us to the moon! Not to mention that I’ve wired that device to recording equipment to record that chat to share it with all of you. WHAT A WORLD! But I digress…

I guess the point I’m trying to make is this. In a time where people text or email instead of call one another to converse, the podcast medium has become a vital tool to allow people to talk one on one to share and unpack ideas while others can listen in. Whether you agree or disagree with what you’re hearing is subjective and it’s up to you to decide whether to keep or recycle the information you’re absorbing. The important part is to listen. I’m still learning that vital skill and tend to get excited and talk over folks sometimes. It’s not intended to be rude, it just is. It’s a learning process.

As soon as you’re done reading this, call someone to just say hello. I’m going to call my buddy Kirby.