patti brehler

Facing Sunset, 3800 solo miles, a woman’s journey back and forward is a coming-of-a-certain-age story framed within the sixty-year-old author’s 2016 bicycle ride from her home in northeastern Michigan to Missoula, Montana.

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Forty years earlier, patti brehler was one of over 4000 bicyclists participating in Bikecentennial ’76, a transcontinental ride honoring our nation’s 200th birthday. It wasn’t her first tour, but those eighty-four days pedaling west to east influenced her “ride her own road” approach to living. It left her yearning for what she dubbed a “Forrest Gump” ride—riding until she was done.

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After her father’s death in 2015, patti learned of the 40th-anniversary celebration of Bikecentennial ’76. Her mother’s good health meant a break in caregiving. How cool to ride to Missoula for the party while she still could? Off she went, with her husband’s blessing. Alone, but not without ability or a belly full of butterflies.

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More than a bicycle travelogue memoir, Facing Sunset is a reflection on a rebellious, pioneering life; an affirmation of what a woman can accomplish against physical and metaphorical headwinds; a witnessing of the people populating our vast and wondrous country—who are more alike than different when the veils of politics are stripped away. It’s about how a lifelong dream brought the author to the right place in her life, “facing sunset,” even as her dream’s fulfillment wasn’t quite what she expected.

 

Interested in an intimate experience of pedaling across the country without actually sweating? Sit with patti on her comfortable recumbent bicycle. Meet headwinds, heat, arduous climbs, thrilling downhills, otherworldly landscapes, and synchronistic encounters. Interactions with strangers show hope for humanity. Struggle with her as she debates what “being done” means, even as she comes to terms with the universe.

 

“I hover among stars at the brink of earth and water, existing in human form this brief moment of time, occupying a nano-space of no consequence, at once all and nothing,” she writes her first night out. Her way of being in the moment and trusting herself is an inspiration to anyone trying to find their own way.