D.U.N.C.A.N.3.5

By Miles Patrick Yohnke

© 2024 All Rights Reserved.

Duncan MacPherson

August 9, 2024, will mark thirty-five years since my friend, Duncan MacPherson died under suspicious and tragic conditions. In 2009 I exercised a practice in where I placed white tape on each finger of my two hands starting one month before he departed and wrote the letters 'D.U.N.C.A.N.2.0.' to mark the twentieth anniversary of his physical death. I did this to challenge myself in cycling and training my body to go further within and to go further with my existence.

I wrote an article that year of 2009 titled: "D.U.N.C.A.N.2.0."

Now fifteen years have passed--and I have found myself wanting to honour Duncan MacPherson once again. This time I too wanted to not only celebrate his life but a few others that either physically departed far too young or have had an enormous impact on my existence.

My plan was to cycle 200 plus kilometers or 120 plus miles in a single day. I pondered on how many and I found my being telling me five. At first, I didn't fully understand why five but later I realized it was Him telling me that five represented five years since my mother physically departed (August 31, 2019) and too I would be honouring her.

Bridget Rose Yohnke • Francis Lewis Yohnke (circa 1952)

In each cycle certain lives would be honoured on top of my friend, Duncan MacPherson. The first adventure occurred on Monday June 24, 2024, when I went to the Gardiner Dam in the province of Saskatchewan and back with a total distance of 214 kilometers door-to-door or 133 miles. This trip was also for my father who was the supervisor of the tunnel digging for this gigantic project. His role helping build the tunnels lasted almost four years (a few years before I was born and another year after). You see I was conceived--and I came into the world while he worked there, and to travel there by bicycle would be a great way of honouring my father.

My second adventure came on Saturday, June 29, 2024, when I cycled to Prince Albert Saskatchewan and back with a total distance of 290 kilometers or 180 miles. This trip was also for Dr. Joseph Patrick Cunningham, Julia Cunningham's father who sadly departed to cancer in 1991. He physically didn't experience the colossal career she would have and mammoth selflessness that her human being would become.

Dr. Joseph Patrick Cunningham tombstone

Miles with tombstone

Tuesday, July 9, 2024, would mark my third adventure and this one would be to The Battlefords in Saskatchewan and back and a total distance of 308 kilometers or 191 miles. This trip was for my twenty-year-old cousin Brenda Gerein who was killed in a head-on accident on Sunday February 24, 1985, just outside of North Battleford near Denholm Saskatchewan, and for Dr. Joseph Patrick Cunningham who physically departed in 1991 which is when I started a new chapter in my life and a career in the beauty industry that took me out to The Battlefords every three weeks for that decade of the 1990s.

My fourth adventure was on Wednesday, July 24, 2024, when I cycled to Watson Saskatchewan via highway 16 to highway 2 and through Meacham over to highway 5 and through Humboldt to Watson then on highway 6 back to highway 16 and back to Saskatoon. A total distance of 404 kilometers or 251 miles in a single day. This trip was for CTV's Jeff Rogstad as Watson Saskatchewan is where the Rogstad's homesteaded. Jeff Rogstad has had a profound impact on my life having so many of my friends on his television show, including Julia Cunningham on Friday, May 1, 2020. The trip was also for Henry Buitrago and the Buitrago family as he is the person behind https://yohnke.com and has been a selfless friend to me since our Creator brought him into my life many years ago.

Miles, at age sixty. Photos by Henry Buitrago

The fifth adventure came on Monday, July 29, 2024, when I cycled to Rosetown, over to Biggar, and back to Saskatoon. This trip was a total distance of 293 kilometers or 182 miles. This trip was also for my parents, Francis and Bridget Yohnke and their parents for they grew up in the Biggar area, my mother in Landis Saskatchewan and my father's parents resting place is in the Biggar cemetery.

Life is about the distance we will travel to get to know ourselves fully. To become one with self. You're aligning yourself on a spiritual path -- yours and theirs -- you're connected to you and to them.

You find yourself powered by a Higher Power - you find yourself limitless on what you're capable of which is servicing Him and His creations.

Balance on a bicycle is to keep moving and the balance in life is to come to understand why you move.

In D.U.N.C.A.N.2.0. I reference the morning glory flowers, that if you look closely at them, they'll show you how extraordinary they are both in colour and texture. And that in their centre, is a kind of golden light that shines from within. At the end of the day, they turn a most beautiful shade of lavender and then close up, wither, and die. They live for only one day and then they are gone.

And like I talked about fifteen years ago with the morning glory flower, and a light in the centre - if we properly align ourselves, we will glow with a golden light.

For everything on the astonishing life and tragic physical death of Duncan MacPherson, please click here: https://salmonstudio.wixsite.com/yohnke/post/d-u-n-c-a-n-2-0

I didn't do any of these five adventures with my race bike. I did it on the bike shown. This bicycle isn't geared for the highway nor is the 'sit-up and beg' riding position ideal to cut through the wind. I used it to create even more chaos to my body. I like to give special thanks to Garth Sheard who gifted me this 1990 Trek 800 mountain bike that he purchased in 1990 and gave me in the fall of 2017.

Carla Shynkaruk and CTV Saskatoon did a story on Duncan MacPherson to mark the thirty-fifth anniversary of his passing. To watch, please click here.