Yes, We Are Asking For Trouble--As She Defines It

Bicycling has heightened my sense of social justice, I believe.  Perhaps that has to do with the fact that cyclists come from literally all parts of society and ride for all sorts of reasons, whether out of necessity, for pleasure or fitness, or to make a statement.  

Likewise, being a transgender woman has, I believe, sensitized me to what some other opressed groups of people endure.  When I talk to Black people or read their accounts of being told that they're "whining" or "exaggerating" when they related the micro- and macro-aggressions they endure--or, worse, are told, openly or implicitly, that they were "looking for trouble" when they complained or "brought it on themselves" for not being, in essence, one of the "good ones"--I at least empathise with them.

In other words, I know what it's like to be told that you're to blame for whatever happens to you because you are what you are by people who would never be held to account for their indiscretions, let alone misdeeds.  To wit:   Someone can drive while texting, or gun through a red light, but the cyclist that driver hits or runs over will be blamed for the "accident."

And now we learn that on "Britain's Got Talent," English men and women have the opportunity to show that they have just as much talent as folks on the other side of the pond for clueless meanness or mean cluelessness.  Amanda Holden, who seems to be Albion's answer to one of the Kardashians (i.e., she has no talent, at least none I can discern, save for self-promotion) is a judge of BGT.  That gives her a platform for making all sorts of smug, ridiculous and simply toxic pronouncements.  

What pearl of wisdom did she impart to the world?  This:  Cyclists who wear cameras are "asking for trouble."

Let's follow the logic of her dictum:

Drivers who use dashcams are looking for trouble.

Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, non-heterosexual, non-cisgender people who record their job interviews or encounters with law enforcement or other authorities are "asking for trouble."

But people who drive intoxicated, distracted or too fast--or break some other law.  Naah, they're fine.  So are cops who lie or interviewers who tell qualified members of minority groups, "We don't feel you would be a good fit with the culture of this organization."

Yeah, we're all "asking for trouble" because to folks like Ms. Holden, people like us having the same rights as hers, and geting the same respect as human beings is "trouble," indeed!

 

Just a reminder why I wear mine @AmandaHolden @theJeremyVine. Go on, tell me it was me asking for it. 🤪 pic.twitter.com/mswxOBnbFN

— Wayne (@waynebago1) June 5, 2022

Happily Riding In A Moment Fugue

I have just had about as nice a cycling weekend as one can have without going to a country like the Netherlands or France where they actually see bikes as forms of transportation and recreational vehicles for people of all ages.

It rained during much of the past week. The good news is that I had a chance to catch up--or at least make progress--on a couple of bike- and writing-related projects. I'll say more about those later. As skies clared late Friday afternoon, while my religious faith did not return, it was enough to get me thinking that the cycling gods--some of whom I've written about in earlier posts-- were smiling on us.

We are in that "sweet spot" between spring and summer:  The air warm enough to cycle shorts and a light top, the water just warm enough for a swim or at least a dip (depending, of course, on your temperature sensitivity) and skies so clear--yes, even here in New York--that no matter how or where you ride, more roads, more fields, more water, stretch ahead of you--and the flowers that have budded and bloomed for the past few weeks pulse with color.

So I did a back-to-back of two old favorites:  Connecticut (the longer and hillier ride) on Saturday and Point Lookout yesterday.  While I am thinking, perhaps, of even longer rides in the coming weeks, I was content with what some might call the "Zen" way of riding:  I enjoyed the individual moments and what some might call The Moment of the rides writ large.

About the longer rides I'm considering:  I might ride from my apartment to some place from which I can't return on the same day.  I'd also like to go further away, to take one of the trips that were postponed by the pandemic.  While I had been planning to go to places I'd never been before, and I hope to take those trips, whether this year or some other times, I feel even more of an urge to see people I haven't seen in a while and other people I've "met" through this blog and other online means but have never seen in person.

But the past weekend's cycling is as fine as any I've experienced in a while.  More like it would make me happy.

A Tell-Tale Sign

When I first became a dedicated cyclist, as a teenager in the mid-1970s, I knew some men who wouldn't ride because they didn't want to shave their legs.

I would explain that racers did it because, they believed, it gave them an aerodynamic advantage.  Whether or not there is such a benefit, there was another reason for racers to depilate their limbs:  It made cleaning and dressing wounds easier.  But even when I had pretensions to racing, I never believed that it was necessary to shave if one simply wanted to ride a bike.

My body hair has always been so light and fine, and grown so slowly, that almost nobody can tell whether or not I've shaved.  Today I can go for months without putting a blade to my calves and shins:  From what my doctor has told me and what I've heard and read in other places, my hormones and surgery have slowed the growth, which was always slow anyway.

But if you see someone with thickets of coarse hair on his limbs, there is at least one thing you can assume about him:

To Keep Cars Out Of Bike Lanes

One reason why I, and other New York City cyclists, don't use bike lanes is that motorists too often use them as passing or parking lanes.  

One of the most dangerous situations I encounter is only a block from my apartment.  The Crescent Street bike lane, which runs right in front of my door, is a two-way path separated from the one-way street by bollards (flexible posts).  If I am pedaling north, the direction opposite the traffic, and a vehicle--usually a taxi or Uber vehicle--pulls into the lane to drop off or pick up somebody at the Mount Sinai Hospital entrance--there is no place to go except into the traffic lane because, as often as not, the sidewalk is also blocked.

Such scenarios are repeated  in bike lanes all over the city, often by drivers who have less legitimate reasons for pulling into the lane than the ones who stop at Mount Sinai.  

Brad Hoylman. Check out his tie! (WireImage)

Thankfully, two New York State legislators--who, not surprisingly, are cyclists--have taken note of this problem.  They are proposing that cameras of the type used to catch speeders and red light-runners to detect scofflaw drivers in bike lanes.  Under their proposal, 50 locations--mainly in physically-separated bike lanes like the one on my street--would be the first to receive the cameras.   "We think there needs to be enforcement," said Brad Hoylman a State Senator from Manhattan and one of the sponsors of the proposal. 

Zohran Mandani (Photo by Brigitte Stelzer)

The proposal's other co-sponsor, Zohran Mandani, a State Assemblyman from Brooklyn, admits that the proposal won't be a "silver bullet" to keep the lanes clear.  He and Holyman explained, however, that knowing the cameras are in use could be a deterrent, as they are for drivers who might otherwise break other traffic laws.  So would the prospect of a $50 fine.

To be implemented as a policy, the proposal needs the approval of the New York City Department of Transportation, which has indicated that it would support such legislation.

When Will World Bicycle Day Be For Everyone Who Cycles?

 Today is World Bicycle Day.

The United Nations designated this "holiday" was in 2018.  Whether it has contributed to the growth in cycling is debatable.  But I won't argue with having such a day.

Interestingly, it's also National Free Donut Day.  We have to get our carbs one way or another, right?

Anyway, while one sees bike lanes winding through urban neighborhoods and bike-share programs and bikes, parts and accessories have been in short supply, the attention to such things has focused on the ways they affect young, upwardly mobile people in trendy urban neighborhoods--where, to be fair, the growth in the number of cyclists seems to be greatest.

An article in today's Forbes magazine illustrates, if unintentionally, a possible cause and effect of the phenomena I've mentioned.  In it, Jeffrey Steele lists, as his title says, "buildings supporting pedal power."  The office and residential towers he mentions feature dedicated bicycle parking rooms, some with security cameras and other amenities.  Some of those buildings also include lockers where cyclists can stow their bike-related stuff.  The commercial buildings he mentions also have washrooms or even showers and changing rooms and, in one instance, a cafe.

The bike room at 45 Main Street in DUMBO, Brooklyn (Photo from Two Trees Management)

It all sounds really good.   I know this city well enough, however, to see that all of those buildings are places where the residents or workers are the sort of young and affluent (or, at least, upwardly mobile) folks I mentioned at the beginning of this post.  Now, I don't have anything against young afflueint people--OK, I get a bit envious of people making more in their first job out of college than I've ever made (I shouldn't have graduated into a recession with a liberal arts degree, right?). My issue is this:  Bicycling and cyclists will never get the respect, or at least escape the scorn and hostility, of greater society until, well, all segments of greater society start cycling for transportation and recreation.  Also, I think cycling won't become a "people's choice" in the United States or other nations that don't have the cycling culture of some European countries until people who ride to low-wage jobs on handed-down, salvaged or bought-for-cheap bikes are given the same attention and respect as the Instagram images one sees rolling down bike lanes in Williamsburg or other havens of the young, rich and hip.

So, I hope that, if nothing else, World Bicycle Day becomes a way to give all cyclists--rich, poor, male, female, genderqueer and ahem, white, black, brown, yellow, red or whatever color--the respect we deserve for getting to where we want and need to go in a socially and environmentally conscious--and fun!--way.

Oh, and  remember that you can "fuel" your ride for free at your nearest Dunkin' Donuts, Krispy Kreme or Tim Horton’s!

How Is It Aging?

Aged 12 years.

When I saw that phrase--on a bottle of Scotch whiskey--I wasn't 12 years old.  I couldn't quite fathom that grown-ups drank something older than I was.

Now I am at an age when I don't think of something as having occurred 12 years ago.  Now I'm more likely to round it up or down to 15 or ten years.  Someone, I forget whom, told me that it happens when "you get to a certain age":  According to that person, you start to see your life, and the world, "in five- or ten-year increments."

There are, of course, some things I can pinpoint in time.  One of them is the subject of today's post.  

Exactly twelve years ago today, this blog was born. At least, that is the day on which I wrote and published my first post.  For two years before that, I'd been writing another blog, Transwoman Times, which I continued for a few years into the life of this blog and, in a way, this blog is an extension, continuation or simply a relative--I'm still not sure of which--of that one.

Now, some might say that I've reached an age when I can no longer say I'm in "mid-life."  To them, I'll repeast something I've said in this blog, and elsewehere:  If I don't know how long I'm going to live, I can't know whether or not I'm in the middle of my life.  Given the typical and even the longest lifespans of humans, I can't plausibly say I'm at the beginning or even early in my life.  But as long as I don't know where I end, I'm in the middle--just as I can't know whether a ride I take will be the last, or one of the last--or even whether it's the last time I'll take a particular ride, such as the one to Greenwich or Point Lookout.

Whether you've been reading this blog from its beginning, or found it yesterday, I thank you for taking the time to read it.  And however long this blog--and I--last, I hope you're with me for the journey.  We're only in the middle of it, after all!

He Didn't Have A Phantom Condition. He Was Assaulted.

When I wrote for newspapers, a few things frustrated me.  Among them were politicians and other officials who'd talk around my questions.  Another was the constraints one editor put on me and other writers.  So, as I complained to another writer, "I can write about cops and robbers but I can't write about the real crimes."

But nothing twisted my panties or chamois bike short liners (remember those?) more than headline writers.  They'd come up with phrasings that, sometimes said something different from, or even the exact opposite of, what my article described.  Or sometimes what they wrote things that someone, especially if they came from a different generation, culture or other life experience might hear differently from what was intended.

I saw an example of this today:  "Boy Beaten and Bruised in Bicycle Face Attack at LI School Parking Lot:  Cops."  

Now, perhaps I'm a bit of a geek, at least in this sense:  I can say, without boasting, that I probably know more about the history of bicycles and bicycling than anyone who's not a specialist in that field.  So when I saw "Bicycle Face," I immediately thought of the rationale conservatives during the 1885-1905 Bike Boom gave for keeping women off bicycles.  They believed that the rigors of being out in public, in rain and wind and sun, and of simply being on a bicycle, twisted their pretty little heads into what they called "Bicycle Face."

Now, of course, with all due respect to Long Island law enforcement officials, I doubt that their training includes ways of recognizing Bicycle Face--or that most of them have even heard of the term, even if they are cyclists.  And I think it's even less likely that some random thug (the victim is a 13-year-old boy; the perp is believed to be a good bit older and six feet tall) would attack someone for having "Bicycle Face," though, perhaps I can imagine using the phrase as a schoolyard taunt.

Now, I don't mean to make light of a boy being bashed in the face with a bicycle.  No one should have to endure that, and it upsets me that something that can be such a force for good and a source of so much pleasure can be used to commit violence against another living being.  My heart goes out to that boy and his loved ones.

But, as a writer, I also abhor crimes against journalism and the English language.  A much more accurate--and, if I do say so myself, snappier--headline might've been: LI Man Slams Bike Against Boy's Face.

The Unofficial Beginning

 Here in the US, the Memorial Day weekend is often seen as the “unofficial beginning of summer.” The weather, and my rides, certainly lived up to that billing.

First, as an aside, I’ll tell you how the holiday came to be the “unofficial beginning of summer.  One interesting fact about Memorial Day is that the date on which it’s observed has nothing to do with any battle, the birth of any historic figure or any other historical or mythical event.  When the holiday was first designated, it was called Decoration Day (when I was a child, some people still referred to it that way) because people—some of them newly-freed slaves—decorated the graves of Union soldiers who died fighting the Civil War.  In those days, there wasn’t a flowers.com or even very many florists.  So, people had to pick flowers from their gardens or the woods.  And, as the holiday was commemorated only in the northern US, late May was chosen because that’s when flowers are in full bloom in this part of the world.

Anyway, about my rides: They are both trips I've taken many times before. On Saturday, I pedaled up to Greenwich, Connecticut via the Pelham Bay Park trail and back roads and streets in Mamaroneck, Rye and Greenwich.  The weather was all but perfect:  warm, but not too, with a breeze that seemed to ripple the wisps of clouds in the blue, sunny sky. Yesterday, I rode to Point Lookout on a warmer day, though the temperature dropped a good bit after I crossed the Veterans' Memorial Bridge (how appropriate!) to the Rockaways.

I felt great after both rides. That, to me, is another sign that summer is, if not here, at least close:  I am in better shape.  But, apart from the roads and views, the rides offered one interesting contrast.  My ride to Connecticut reminded me of the ones I took in the early days of the pandemic:  I saw hardly a car or SUV, let alone a truck, along the way.  I glanced out to the main roads and didn't see much more traffic, and when I passed over the highways (the Cross Bronx Expressway, Hutchinson River Parkway and New York State Thruway), I saw even less traffic than I normally see on a Sunday morning or afternoon.  On the other hand, not surprisingly, I saw a lot of vehicular traffic on the roads leading to the beaches and foot traffic along the boardwalks and pedestrian paths.

Today is, in more ways than one, the day after--the  beginning of summer, for one thing.

A Ride To Remember Them

Today is Memorial Day in the United States.

To some, things are returning to "normal" because parades, and other gatherings large and small--including retail store promotions-- will be held in person for the first time in three years.

For others, though, things will never be "normal," whatever that meant, again. Or, for them, there is a new definition of "normal."

Such people include the loved ones of those who died as a result of COVID--or this nation's nonstop wars.  Such folks include Chris Kolenda, a retired U.S. Army Colonel.  

Today, he will take a 100-mile Memorial Day Honor Ride.  It will be followed by a barbeque and auction event at the Milwaukee County War Memorial Center.  He plans to use the ride, barbecue and auction to raise awareness for another, longer, ride he plans to start in late September.

That will take him across half of the nation to Arlington National Cemetery,  just outside Washington, DC.  That destination is not surprising, but, unless you know the motivation for his ride, its starting point is.  

He's using his planned trip to raise money for the Saber Six Foundation, which he created to help the families and descendants of the unit he commanded in Afghanistan.  The Foundation also supports a Rotary Club scholarship endowment for disadvantaged youths who aspire to public service.

During one particularly horrific tour in 2007, the West Point graduate lost six of the men under his command.  One of them, Private First Class Chris Pfeiffer, hailed from Spalding, Nebraska--the starting point of Kolenda's planned tour.

From there, his route will take him to the gravesites of the five other soldiers who lost their lives:

    Carroll, Iowa--Sergeant Adrian Hike 

    Ellwood, Illinois--Specialist Jacob Lowell

    Hall, Indiana--Staff Sergeant Ryan Fritsche

    Minersville, Pennsylvania--Captain David Boris

    Arlington National Cemetery--Major Tom Bostick.

"They all died following my orders, doing things I asked them to do, being in a place I asked them to be," Kolenda said.  "They deserve to have their stories told and they deserve to have their sacrifices remembered."

The first sentence of his statement should be on the gravestone of anyone who has led soldiers, sailors or other uniformed fighters who died under his or her command.  Alter it slightly--I died following orders, doing what I was asked to do in a place where I was asked to be--and you have an epitaph for anyone who's died in battle.

Photos of Chris Kolenda by Jovanny Hernandez, for the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

Cycling Is Better Than....

 So-- Why does a girl ride?

Specifically, why does this girl (yours truly) ride?