Practice day.

Which sounds simple,
      if you’ve never tried
      to move six people through Montreal

      with tickets,
           weather,
           transit,
       wrong turns,
   good intentions,
   and one very loud thing…

   waiting somewhere on the other side of the river.

Mike and I went early.

Two scouts,
    brave and stupid enough
    to take the chaos first
    so everybody else could inherit

    the slightly cleaner version of the map.

This was noble.

This was useful.

This took two hours.

Multiple missteps.
Multiple recalculations.
Multiple versions of:

         No, wait, I think it’s this way.

Before we even left the BNB,
  I had distributed tickets
                to everyone.

Responsible.
Organized.
Borderline impressive.

Then we made it to the river
     before I realized
     I’d given everyone their tickets

     except me.

Mine was on my computer.

Not my phone.

Because apparently even competence has track limits.

So: bike back to the BNB.

Retrieve the ticket.

Invent a new bad idea.

Uber to the track.

Montreal heard this plan,
        laughed politely,
       and redirected us
      through fourteen wrong turns

      to a casino shuttle bus.

Which, honestly, feels about right.

Formula 1 should not be easy to approach.

You _should_ have to prove you mean it.

The BFFs rolled in an hour later
         with a much easier ride,
            because the universe
              enjoys humiliating
                   advance teams.

Fine.

They got there.

We got there.

The day got there.

And then: the sound.

Not television sound.

Not highlight-reel sound.

Not somebody describing horsepower
    like a brochure wearing sunglasses.

The actual thing.

Engines tearing open the air.

Grandstands waking up.

The whole place vibrating
    with that first stupid grin
    you get when the hype
    finally has the nerve

    to be true.

It lived up.

All the way up.

Then some.

Mari was there.

The two BFFs were there.

Mike was there,
     Ohio by way of Puerto Vallarta,
     because apparently

     this story has a shared-universe problem.

Taha made it after work,
          boss’s nephew,
        local advantage,
    subbing in for Gary

    after the motorcycle accident sidelined him.

Sorry, Gary.

He got there just in time for sprint qualifying,
   which felt like the day rewarding us

   for surviving its little obstacle course.

A great time was had by all.

Actual sentence.

Earned sentence.

Then dinner.

And here is where
I made my mistake.

I sat next to Mari.

Simple enough.

Normal enough.

Adult enough,
      if you say it fast
      and refuse to check

      the telemetry.

But proximity has its own physics.

Especially with her.

Especially after engines,
              adrenaline,
            travel chaos,
           survival math,
       and a day full of

                  almost,
                 finally,
                   there.

We didn’t attack each other at the table.

This is technically an achievement.

Respectable restraint,
            as they say
            in all the finest

            motorsport dining rooms.

Turns out track limits aren’t just painted on the corners.

Sometimes they’re
          the distance between two chairs,
                               two elbows,


          one look held half a second too long,
          and whatever small mercy

          keeps a restaurant from becoming evidence.

Dinner ended.

Mike and I took our leave.

Cool-down lap.

Or something like it.

We stumbled into
   an amazing tiny beach bar,
   which is a ridiculous thing
   to find in Montreal

   and therefore

   exactly where the day needed to end.

A beer.

Or two.

A recap.

The kind that only works
    when the day was too much
         in all the right directions.

Now morning is here,
    beautiful and bright,

    and the crew has changed again.

Sharesa in from DFW.

Taha for the full day.

Mari taking the morning for some much-needed sleep.

The rest of us
    pointed back toward the track,
                less innocent now,
                  better prepared,

    still probably wrong about something.

That’s fine.

Practice is over.

Start those engines.

Let’s see some go.