It’s hard to believe we’re already waving the checkered flag on January 2020. In racing terms, January is still very much the off-season, as the motorsports world awaits the Daytona 24 Hours. In terms of my writing, January has always been a month of reminiscing, which should be good for an aspiring novelist, except that I always end the month with more undelivered love notes than chapters completed.
Alas, January 2020 was different. I’m on the verge of finishing my first novel – a three-year project that I often find excuses not to wrap up. It’s hard to let a story go, especially when it deals with persons who are no longer in your life.
I often struggle with January, but a newfound love for endurance racing has filled my heart. You see, I grew up watching Formula One on Sunday mornings, where races sometimes finish before you’re fully awake. F1 can be solitary. It’s kind of challenging to throw watch parties for the Monaco Grand Prix at 7:30 a.m. on a Sunday.
In 2019, however, I attended the Daytona 24 with my friend Max – a brother who wouldn’t say no to a Monaco watch party either! I realized that one of the joys of endurance racing is sharing an entire day with people who are important in your life.
It’s a race of incredible joys and crushing defeats, of bright sunny afternoons and chilly rainy nights, of drivers who keep pushing lap after lap after lap. Endurance racing is a team sport, with several drivers taking turns on a single car, keeping the race alive, even when one is already exhausted. Much more than Formula One, endurance racing sounds a lot like life.
It sounds a lot like the highs and lows of January to me.
Fast forward one year. Just last weekend, I was privileged to compete on a virtual Daytona 24, together with five fellow members from my SimPossible family. I don’t use the term “family” lightly. SimPossible is a group of disabled sim racers who came together in 2018 to create a championship where we can just be ourselves and race to the best of our abilities.
No drama, no racing protests, no name-calling. Just pure, old-fashioned, door-banging racing.
When we aren’t on the track, we remain active on our Facebook private chat, where topics range wildly. The chat is also our safe space, our opportunity to offer love and support when a member is hurting, a place where we celebrate job promotions, and even risk some relationship advice.
Most importantly, what happens in the chat stays in the chat.
So when we have the opportunity to do endurance races, we jump on it like children on Christmas morning. While we race, we are also talking via TeamSpeak, a natural extension of our chat. These are times when we forget that we’re single and live by ourselves away from family (like yours, truly). We forget that dates and job interviews can be tricky when you have cerebral palsy, need a wheelchair, experience hearing difficulties, or suffer from less-known disabilities that the society as a whole can’t accept.
While I’m racing with these guys, I forget about the times when January wasn’t so kind to the heart. Instead, I remember the good moments of years long gone: traveling with my family, learning ping pong during a snow storm, falling in love with a best friend.
And while I wish I could turn back the clock and fix all the wrecks of January (some of them caused by me), I know that life must move forward, despite the bumps and scratches we have sustained. Just like living with a disability. Just like wrangling a racecar around a track.
Fernando Mattos 