My wonderful wife and I rode the tandem all three days, well, both weekend days and Friday and it was fantastic. In fact, it felt a little off riding my Trek at the cycling club’s annual new member ride yesterday.

Part of the positive nature of riding together with my wife on a tandem is that working as a team on a bicycle translates to working well together off the bike. Even better, working together on the tandem helped remind us how our marriage should be when we weren’t working all that well together off the bike.

I’m thinking about how special this weekend was. My stoker wife rode that tandem like she meant it. I could feel a little more effort up the hills – a few times I really had to put some major watts down to ensure she wasn’t pedaling through me. It was awesome. We also developed a code for coasting and riding over tracks so she wouldn’t get caught sitting on the saddle over rough train tracks, and we developed a series of silent gestures to let the other know they were doing well, were appreciated, or just a simple, “I’m having an awesome time with you. I love you” as we led the pack out.

Our rise to tandemdom has been an effort on both our part. In the process, especially in the last couple of months our marriage went from good to stellar. We set a wrecking ball to our emotional barriers, fears and insecurities. We learned to, rather than argue, work together for actual, real solutions. We choose that rather than make demands and damage the relationship… which leads to more emotional barriers, fear and insecurity. That effort off the bike made it all the more wonderful on the bike. Things that used to baffle us are quickly turned into solutions. There’s so much love in our house, are daughters often break down into tears when they talk about the profound changes.

In fact, I’m thinking this actually may need a Friday series because I feel the need to share this miracle. I get the idea I may be meant to… I’ll kick the tires on this.

Anyway, as my buddy, Mike likes to say, “A tandem is either a marriage maker or a marriage breaker”. Our tandem helped make our marriage what it is today by showing us, but me in particular, how to work together for a decent goal.