Today I took what, probably, will be my last ride of 2024. It more or less followed an unplanned route my neighbor Sam and I rode earlier this year, through four of New York City’s five boroughs.
Having moved to the Bronx earlier this year, I’ve been exploring some new routes. I think I’ve found a couple that will be part of my regular routines and, more important, won’t simply be adaptations of rides I took while living in Astoria.
I guess looking for, and doing, those new rides has been emblematic of what 2024 has been for me: not only adapting to, but creating from, change.
Nine months ago I left Astoria, where I lived 21 years, for a senior citizens’ apartment by the New York Botanical Garden and Fordham University. I cried every night, and many days, for a few weeks. The change wasn’t just one of geography or living space: Many of my new neighbors indeed fit, for better and worse, American society’s notions of “old” people. Some use walkers or wheelchairs; others are infirm in less visible ways. But they also have lived lives, some of which I can scarcely imagine but others that are familiar in ways I hadn’t expected.
 |
| Seen during my ride today—in the Bronx. |
While I am not the only person in my building who rides a bicycle, I’ve developed an identity as “the bike rider” or “la ciclista” among other residents. Perhaps it’s because they see me more frequently on or with one of my bikes than they see other residents with theirs.
Whatever anyone’s perception might be, as long as I am cycling, I am in the middle of my life—and the change from one year to another is but another part of my journey.
So here’s to the end of 2024 and the beginning of 2025–in the middle of my life.
No comments:
Post a Comment