things work out

Life is full of so many coincidences and synchronicities that feel beyond explanation, so I decided to start writing them down. This is an ongoing, non-exhaustive list of those inexplicable moments, categorized by...well, whatever I feel like categorizing them by.

2024

I was trying to get from a tiny town in Costa Rica to the capital (San Jose) to catch a flight, but I couldn't find any bus schedules, so I started hitchhiking. The first car that passed picked me up and took me 20mi to another town. I walked 100 yards and saw people getting on a bus...I asked them where they were going and they said San Jose. Perfect.

2023

Jonah crashed in the middle of nowhere in rural Oaxaca, broke his bike, and hurt his ankle and wrist. We turned around and limped him and the bike back towards the nearest town, and literally the very first mark of civilization we saw was a sign that said "Taller de Motocicletas" (motorcycle workshop). Then we got served cold Coronitas and homemade mezcal while his bike got fixed. (More info towards the end of this ride report post.)

Danny, Jonah, and I met a rider named Miguel while waiting to get on a ferry in Baja. We stayed at his house for 2 days in central Mexico a couple weeks later, and then he hooked us up with another guy named Ivan in Chiapas (750mi away) who put us up in his motorcycle clubhouse, stored our bikes in his garage for free for a full year, and helped us get the bikes fixed up while we were gone. Oh, and he drove us to and from the airport.

We met a rider named Miles in Baja, who helped us fix our first flat tire. Hundreds of miles later, he rode into a gas station as we were fixing our second flat tire! He took this picture of us:

2022

After months of looking, I finally found a warehouse space in Brooklyn that was a block from where I lived, relatively affordable, and had a landlord who was happy for me to do whatever I wanted in there. That space became Highside Workshop. I have yet to see another place on the market with that combination of price, location, and permissiveness.

A friend of a friend of a friend named Dom suggested we do a show early on in Highside's existence. He's a freakishly good guitarist and deeply connected to the NYC music scene, and that show and his connections kickstarted Highside's growth into a place that community arts and events happen.

2018

A guy named Adam found the ride report for my first big motorcycle trip, read that I knew how to program, and offered me an internship at TomTom in NH via ADVRider which I took (and commuted to on my CX500).

I ended up in a Native Alaskan town called Tatitlek in rural Alaska, took a picture of a random tiny house there, and posted it in a ride report. Another guy I knew through ADVRider messaged me and told me his wife had worked as a teacher in Tatitlek in the '80s, and stayed in that house!!

2017

When I was 18, I destroyed the rear brake of my '79 Honda CX500 outside Yosemite. The next day I met a guy who introduced me to Larry Cargill, who's sorta the CX500 guru. He spent 3 days going through my entire bike and fixing everything, and I'm still friends with him 6 years later.

Same trip: I blew out my cooling system in Asheville, NC, and had no idea at all how to fix it. A machinist and motorcycle collector named Nick saw me, brought me to his shop, and fixed the whole thing for me for free. (Ride report post here)