Regressing, Repeating Or Regenerating?

 This Spring, so far, has been strange in all sorts of ways.  For one, people are, in some ways, acting as if the COVID-19 pandemic is over:  They're not wearing masks; they're going to restaurants and movies and taking trips.  On another, sometimes I encounter people I haven't seen since the disease struck, or have seen only in passing, and I don't feel as if I am looking at, or talking to, the same person I knew.  Perhaps I, too, am no longer the person people once knew.  And strangers are even more anonymous, and even automotonic than they were before:  They seem even more walled-off from their surroundings, and other people, than they were three and a half years ago..

The weather has been strange, too.  Temperatures haven't been unusually warm--except for yesterday, when it reached 21C (70F)--but there have been combinations of wind and rain, rain and hail, wind and sun and even sun and rain we don't normally see.  There were even tornadoes in Delaware and South Jersey.

But one part of the weirdness of this season appeared to me the other day, during a late-afternoon ride.  That I saw cherry blossoms budding, or beginning to bloom--which always gladdens my heart--along Woodside Avenue wasn't, in itself, out of the ordinary for this part of the world in the first week of April.  But seeing them in that same act of their show as I saw in trees just a few miles away (and, I assume, at more or less the same latitude) three weeks ago made me wonder what's going on.

Not that I'm complaining about seeing what I saw the other day.  Of course, few trees are more beautiful in full bloom than the cherry blossoms.  But something about seeing those early blooms against the sky, in all of their fragility and ephemerality, gives me the strength of my vulnerability.

Introductions At The Beginning of A Season

When I first learned about Western Civilization (yes, with a capital C and capital W!*), I was taught about a period called the Dark Ages, which was in turn followed by the High Middle Ages and the Renaissance.  Everyone seemed to agree that the Dark Ages began when the Roman Empire fell (in the 5th Century C.E.) and ended more or less with the millenium, but there was more debate about the High Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Anyway, I grew up with an image of the Dark Ages as a defoliated, barren landscape broken up by patches of mud and huts from wattles made.  And in the late part of the Middle Ages, the brightening but still austere light of winter-turning-into-spring made the landscape all the more stark.

Years later, when I would first read The Canterbury Tales, I somehow pictured Chaucer writing in such an environment, just as the first buds of irises and crocuses and lilacs were peeking out of sinewy vines and weary earth.  

That landscape of my imagination came to life, more or less, on Saturday, when I went for a ride with Bill and his friend Cindy.  Not that the landscape was a bad thing:  When I ride, it's all good.  And they were fun to ride with.

Our spin took us, ultimately, to the ocean.  Along the way, just after we crossed over the Belt Parkway between the Queens neighborhoods of Ozone Park and Howard Beach, we encountered this entirely appropriate (for the season, but unlikely for the location) sign of the season:

I've ridden horses only a couple of times in my life. I would ride one again.  Even if I don't, though, I'm glad to see them--although I'm sure they'd rather not be fenced in.  Everything about them--their beauty, their movements and the aura they have--reminds me of what I love about cycling.  In fact, they embody, they are, the freedom I feel when I'm in the saddle, with two pedals at my feet and two wheels between me and the street (or ground).

They can skip with the wind.  We can glide with it.  They gallop over reeds and fields.  We pedal by them.  And we and they can trod or slosh through mud--or not.  Our reasons, of course, are different.  We didn't ride through this mud because, well, it wasn't all mud:

It was odd to see such a vista just within the limits of New York City, just before the Atlantic Beach Bridge.  Even when it's full of water, when the tide comes in, it seems almost out of place.  But exposed or submerged, wet or dry, with the tide in or out, it was exactly right for a day like Saturday.



Anyway, these very-early-spring days full of sun and wind--especially when they include rides to the sea--always seem like beginnings.  So, perhaps, it's appropriate that I was riding with a new friend in Bill and I may have made another in Cindy.

And, like the ride I took two weeks ago, I introduced a new bike.  Well, all right, Dee-Lilah, my Mercian Vincitore Special, is indeed a brand-new bike.  But on Saturday, I rode another Mercian that looks brand-new.  

I am talking about Tosca, my fixed-gear bike.  A while back, I sent her to Mercian for repairs and refinishing.  She finally got to see the light of an American day again.

She may have a new look. But she rides like an old friend, only better!  I'll write more about her soon.

N.B.  All of the photos in this post--except for the one of me and Bill--were taken by Bill.  That photo came from Cindy.

Say Hello To Dee-Lilah

I suppose Bill still falls into the category of "new friend" and "new riding buddy".  After all, I've known him only since October.

Yesterday he met my latest friend.  Now you are going to meet her, too.

Here is Dee-Lilah:

Yes, she is the Mercian Vincitore Special I ordered back in May.  Actually, she arrived a week ago and Hal, at Bicycle Habitat, assembled her for me.  I rode her home that evening. But work, other commitments and lousy weather kept me from riding her again until yesterday.

Before meeting up with Bill, I took her for a spin of about 17 kilometers.  That whetted my appetite for more time with her.

Our ride took us through a variety of vistas: spires and windows that justify Brooklyn's nickname "The Borough of Churches", neat row houses in western Queens, the nearly suburban abodes to the east, opulent estates that look out onto the bay and ocean from the Five Towns and the more ramshackle places on the way to the boardwalk at Far Rockaway.

My ride with Bill spanned about 115 kilometers.  So, in all, Dee-Lilah's second ride took me for 130 kilometers, or about 75 miles, of pleasure.

Even with such varied visuals around me, I could hardly keep myself from looking at her.  I mean, I still can't help but to marvel at this bottom bracket:

or these lugs:

All right, I know it's a bit presumptuous to say how beautiful one's own bike is.  But, on my way to meet up with Bill, a couple of guys were wheeling two pricey mountain bikes with all the latest gadgets off a curb.  They stopped themselves, and asked me to stop so they could marvel at my bike.

And, I was about four blocks from my apartment when another guy was getting out of his car and stopped to express his admiration.

It was a bit difficult to stand the bike anywhere, as the day was windy. (It's March, after all!)  But I think Bill got some nice shots of the head tube and other features of the bike.

I'll devote another post to more technical details for the bike.  For now, I'll just say the bike is very aerodynamic.  It must be:  I felt like I was flying. 

Welcome, Dee-Lilah!

Same Ride, Different Day--By Choice

Have you ever done the same ride two days in a row?

Back in my racing days, I sometimes did.  Ditto for the early part of my post-racing life, when I was still pretty young and training for…what, I didn’t know.  But, most of the time, I managed to find a different route every day for the hour or two or three I’d ride before or after work.

It’s rare, though, that I’ll follow the same itinerary two days in a row when I’m riding simply for pleasure.  Today was one of those unusual occasions:  I rode to Point Lookout again.

The sun shone as brightly as it did yesterday.  However, the wind blew harder and the temperature barely made it to 15C (60F) in my neighborhood, in contrast to yesterday’s 27C (80F).  That meant that though the temperature dropped considerably as I rode over the Cross Bay Bridge to the Rockaways, the contrast wasn’t as extreme as it was yesterday.

In addition to being stiffer, the wind blew almost directly from the south-south-east.  Yesterday, it came more directly from the southeast.  So, while I had headwinds, then sidewinds followed by more headwinds on yesterday’s ride, I pedaled into headwinds all the way from my apartment to Point Lookout.  On the other hand, I had a nearly perfect tailwind all the way home.  

One other difference: I rode Arielle, my Mercian Audax, for the first time this year.  I don’t know whether it was because I was so happy to ride her again, but the ride felt even smoother than I recall from earlier seasons.  Best of all, my ride out was faster than I thought it would be and I felt as if I were flying home.

Plus, if I do say so myself, she’s never been prettier.  Arielle always gets compliments; they seemed more common today.  Interestingly, of all of my bikes, it seems that Arielle and Vera (my green Miss Mercian mixte) get the most compliments for their looks.

Another reason why I was happy to be riding Arielle is that the gears sure came in handy when I was pedaling into that wind.  On my way home, I never shifted to anything larger than my third-smallest rear cog (on a nine-speed cassette) and I stayed in my large chainring throughout the ride.

So…I did 100K rides on consecutive days.  I guess that’s not bad considering how little riding I during the past winter, which seemed to end only when I went to Florida the week before last.

The Road--And Season--Ahead

In cycling, any given time of year provides its own trials and pleasures.  In this part of the world, it is early in the Spring.  So far, riding has been a bit arduous but very exhilarating.  I think both have to do with how little riding I did this winter.

The ice and mounds of snow and slush are gone.  Some trees, bushes and other plants are budding now.  They fill me with hope, but do not yet distract me from the ones that are still bare, the ground that is barren from now and the buildings and other structures that bear the patina and show the wear and scars of the season we experienced so recently.  

 

So I am not surprised to see a kind of tentative energy in the steps and body language of people, some of whom I had not seen in months. I guess I ride that way, at least some of the time:  Even though the signs of a new season are around us, something in my body--and mind--still has not quite attuned to its rhythms. At least not yet.  It's almost as if I--and, perhaps, the people I see--still need to be convinced that it is indeed Spring, and we're not going back.

As long as we're moving forward, I guess it doesn't really matter whether we're pushing through mud or promenading along a path lined with cherry blossoms--or pedaling around potholes in the streets.  There is a ride, a season, ahead.

Defining The Season

What's the difference between a late winter and an early spring ride?

Since it's not yet April Fool's Day, this is not a joke.  However, you are free to leave humorous comments.

Here in the Northern Hemisphere, it's been Spring--at least officially--for a bit more than a week.  Some places have had the kind of weather we normally associate with spring for days, or even weeks.  Other places, like Florida, have already had summer-like (at least by the standards of NYC) conditions, if only for a day here and a day there.  On the other hand, there are places like northern New England, much of Canada and the Rockies, where snow still covers the ground.

So what, exactly, makes a ride early spring rather than late winter?  One factor might be the amount of daylight:  There's noticeably more of it than there was even a week or two ago.  And, since Daylight Savings Time began three weeks ago, that daylight (sometimes a gray pallor) lasts to 19h (7:00 pm) or even later.  Of course, the day has begun later, but soon we will have early dawns to go with our late dusks.

That's a fair measure of the seasons.  But the further north one goes in this hemisphere, the more daylight there is.  (Conversely,there is less of it during the fall and winter.) And some of those places are even more packed in snow and ice than this area was after even a series of snowstorms.  For those who are accustomed to such conditions and have studded tires, that might not be such an important factor.  But even such cyclists--some, anyway--do not ride in such conditions.

That brings me to yet another factor in differentiating the seasons:  The number of fellow riders you see on the road or trail. When I rode to Rockaway Beach three weeks ago, I didn't see any other cyclists. Ditto for the ride I took through the Bronx and Westchester a week after that.  But yesterday, I saw dozens of other riders on the bike path that wends its way along the Brooklyn waterfront.  Then again, once I got to the cobblestoned streets around Bush Terminal--deserted on a Sunday--I had them all to myself.  If I go there in a couple of weeks, I'll probably see other riders, though not nearly as many as one encounters on the Kent Street path.

By that standard, the ride I took yesterday was definitely Early Spring, even if the temperature barely broke the freezing mark and the wind whipped against our jackets.

Playing Hide-And-Seek With The Season

Compared to past winters, this one has been brutal--or, at least, especially dreary--and has seemed endless.  This putative beginning of spring feels more like a truce, one that can be broken at any moment, than a true end to the hostilities.

So far, I've done three rides that weren't commutes or related to some specific purposes. Even though I pedaled along streets, paths and boardwalks I've ridden many times before, those rides felt like discoveries and releases at the same time:  The tears that rolled down my cheeks were not only from the wind.

But somehow I feel I rode as furtively as the season slinking its way among bare branches piqued with buds not yet ready to open.  I am like a cat creeping, ready at any moment to scamper back into shelter.

The rides have been really good.  But I am anxious for the season to take root, for flowers to open and to ride expansively and endlessly.  Hopefully all of those things will happen soon. 

Early Spring Ride: Waking Again, For The First Time

So good to be riding just for fun again.  

Yesterday I took one of my seashore rambles that have been so much a part of my cycling life.  You know something's a part of you when you've been away from it for a while and, when you go back, it's like reconnecting with an old friend:  It's familiar and new at the same time.

The beaches and boardwalks are all imprinted in my mind.  And the bracing wind that pushed at me, whipped me sideways and, finally, took me home felt as if it had always traveled with me, in my skin and on it, yet was as bracing and chilly as the air itself feels to someone who's coming out from layers of stilled dreams, of time itself.  

And there is the light I have always seen again for the first time.



I wish all of my fatigue were that of the kind I experienced while riding yesterday:  of waking again for the first time.

Riding Again: Fino Alla Prossima...

The sun shone almost all day today.  People called in to report UFO sightings.

OK, I'm exaggerating just a little.  But it's been weeks, months even, since I've seen as much sun as we've seen today.  So, of course, I took a ride.

Oh, joy!  I get to ride two days in a row and neither of those rides are commutes or errands.  I'll admit, today's ride wasn't the toughest I've ever done.  But my lack of riding this winter showed on the hills in the north Bronx and Westchester County.  

Much of the snow has melted, but I still had to ride over patches of slush mixed with road salt, mud, gravel and the detritus of this season.Both Vera and Helene, my Mercian mixtes, have fenders.  But I've put new chains on both of them and didn't want to clean up their drivetrains all over again.   

Of course, I could blame the LeTour for the added effort I had to expend.  However, the truth of the matter is that I just need to ride more.  The cold is one thing.  But I just will not ride when there's a lot of ice on the streets, as there has been for the past few weeks.  It's one thing to slip and fall into a snowbank on the side of a trial; it's something else to slide and tumble in traffic.

Anyway, it felt so good to be riding again, just for the sake of riding, that I actually started to weep as I pedaled along a path that followed the ever-so-gentle curves--and jagged rocks--of the Bronx River from the Bronx into Westchester County.  Make what you will of that; it felt good, almost as good as the riding itself!

Along the way back, I saw this:

I'm always fascinated to see old signs painted on the sides of buildings. Were the folks who commissioned them seeking immortality?  Of course, I spent the rest of the ride wondering about "Fino, the fighting Congressman"--especially since "Fino" means "till" ("fino a" means "until")  in Italian.

Turns out, he had a really interesting career.  He represented his district for eight terms in the US Congress during the 1950's and 1960's.  Although he was a conservative Republican who introduced legislation to outlaw the Communist Party, he also supported Medicare (which began during his time in Congress), increases in Social Security benefits and financing for mass transit.  But perhaps his most novel idea of all was one he proposed in 1964:  a national lottery to raise revenue for hospitals.  When he proposed it, New Hampshire had just become the first state to authorize a lottery, something no state had during the previous seven decades.

Now that I've read about him, I think much of Fino's politics had at least a touch of class resentment:  At the time, his district consisted mainly of working-class Italian and Irish homeowners who, like him, didn't like the elitism they percieved in politicians like John Lindsay, who served as New York City's mayor during the last two terms Fino spent in Congress.  

What would he have made of someone like me riding a bike through his neighborhood on a day like today?

Two Signs of Spring

Today's commute to work included two sure signs of spring.

One is something most people associate with this season:  the blooming of small flowers.  The violet wave I saw in the breeze were, as it turned out, a carpet of Iris reticulata:

 There must have been something in the light and air:  from a block or so away, I couldn't see the soil and I just barely noticed the green leaves rippling among the sea of indigo petals.

When I got to campus, I noticed another "sea," or at least a wave:

 
Yes, the bike rack was full when I arrived.  Actually,there was one space left--behind the motorcycle.

The weather reports say there's a chance of rain tonight.  One could hardly have guessed that on such a clear, dry--if somewhat brisk--early-spring day. 

Bike and Bed, or Bed and Bike

So why didn't I post yesterday?  Let's see...Should I be creative?  Or tell it straight?  Ha!  Me, doing anything straight.  What a concept!


Anyway...After my first longish ride of the year--which I did on my fixed gear--instead of taking a bubble bath or doing something sensible like that, I did some work.  And got about three hours of sleep.  No, I take that back:  That's how much time I was in bed.  And then I went to work.


So, when I got home last night, late, I went almost immediately to bed...and to sleep, even after having eaten a takeout dinner with way too much sodium and having drunk some tea.

I couldn't have slept any better-- not in my grandmother's arms, not in the plushest bed in Buckingham Palace, nor even in the Bed and Bike Inn--than I did last night.  I slept so deeply that the fog didn't have to come in on little cat's feet (This is probably the only time I will ever quote Carl Sandburg; Do you forgive me?).  It could have echoed in one of the horns of the boats in the harbor and I would have dreamt through it--and not remembered what I dreamt.


Nights like last night make me believe that nothing's better than cycling-induced sleep.