The Massacre In Colorado Springs

Today I will invoke the Howard Cosell Rule.  That is to say, I am going to write about something that has little, if anything, to do with bicycles or bicycling. 

You've heard about it by now:  Some time before midnight on Saturday, a young man dressed in a military-style flak jacket and armed with a long rifle and a handgun--both of which he purchased-- entered Club Q, an LGBTQ night spot in Colorado Springs.  

By the time a couple of patrons subdued him, he'd killed five other patrons and wounded 17 others. At least one of the victims, Ashley Green Paugh, wasn't even a member of the LGBTQ community:  She was with a friend with whom she'd spent the day.  Now there is a girl without a mother and a man without a wife--in addition to the partners, familys and friends who no longer have Daniel Aston, Kelly Loving, Raymond Green Vance and Derrick Rump in their lives. 

The last I heard, authorities were "trying to determine whether" the slaughter was a "hate crime."  Even if the suspect, Anderson Lee Aldrich, didn't know that Sunday was Transgender Day of Remembrance, and some patrons were in Club Q to commemorate it, I don't know how any other motive can be ascribed to him.  After all, if he wanted to kill people just because, there were plenty of other venues he could have chosen, especially on a Saturday night.

As if it weren't enough of a terrible irony or coincidence that it happened on the eve of TDoR or that one of the victims is named "Loving," it turns out that Aldrich, who committed one of the most lawless acts possible, is the grandson of an outgoing California legislator.  Randy Voepel, who lost his re-election bid earlier this month, reacted to the January 6 insurrection with this:  "This is Lexington and Concord. First shots fired against tyranny."  He added, "Tyranny will follow in the aftermath of the Biden swear in (sic) on January 20."

Now, I know some will say that there isn't a direct link between grandfather and grandson when it comes to attitudes about using violence.  But it's hard not to think that Voepel is at least emblematic of some sort of value Aldrich imbibed. Oh, and in June 2021, Aldrich was arrested for making a bomb threat in his mother's home.  Perhaps neither his grandfather nor anyone else in his family taught him that doing such a thing was OK, but I can't help but to think that from somewhere or someone in his environment--whether in his family, community or elsewhere--he got the idea that it's OK to use force and threats thereof to get his way. After all, even the crankiest and most recalcitrant baby isn't born knowing how to do such things.

That he made the threat in his mother's house has been mentioned. So has the fact that, in spite of doing so, he evaded Colorado's "red flag" law, which is supposed to prevent people with criminal convictions from purchasing firearms.  But the media has only hinted at other issues that the slaughter highlights.

Photo by Scott Olson, for Getty Images

One of those issues is that a place like Colorado Springs needs a place like Club Q.  I have spent exactly one day in the city:  I was passing through on my way to someplace else.  The city always touts its proximity to Pike's Peak, which is visible from just about everywhere.  I must admit that made me long, for a moment, to live there, if for no other reason that I'd probably be a better cyclist--or, at least, a better climber--than I am.  

But I also knew that, had I stayed in Colorado Springs, I would be living a very different life. Actually, I might not be living at all:  Aside from being a cyclist, it would be very difficult to be the person I am.  Like many "blue" or "swing" states, Colorado has its red, as in redneck, areas where some have longings like the one a taxi driver expressed to me:  to be in Alaska, Montana, Wyoming or some other place where people live, as he said, "like real Americans."  

Colorado Springs is in that red zone.  But its conservativism is amplified by some of the institutions in and around the city.  The most prominent and visible is the United States Air Force Academy.  There are also several military bases nearby.  And the town is also home to Focus on the Family which, like other right-wing Christian organizations, uses its "focus" on the "family" as a smokescreen for a homo- and trans-phobic, misogynistic, anti-choice agenda.  Several people who were interviewed, including a few lifelong residents, confirm the impression that I have about the city.

As in any place else, kids grow up in the closet. For them, a place like Club Q is the only place where they can safely be themselves.  And there are adult LGBTQ people in places like Colorado Springs because of work or family ties--or simply because they like living in the mountains.  Where else would they meet people in similar circumstances but in a place like Club Q.

Anyway, I couldn't think of much else besides the tragedy in Colorado Springs.  The most terrifying thought of all, though, is that it probably won't be the last.

How Many Can Ride Your Bike?

 Now I am going to separate the guys from the girls.

Wait, why would I do that?

Actually, I am going to separate the generations. If you can remember what I am about to mention, you’re definitely not a Milennial and possibly not of Gen X.

Back before we got cell phones, if you needed to make a phone call away from home, you went to a phone booth.

I am told that for a time, there was a fad among college students: They crammed as many people into one of those booths as they could.  I don’t know whether I wish I’d seen it, but I am glad I never participated in such lunacy:  I’m pretty claustrophobic.

(So what, you ask, am I doing in New York, living in an apartment?)

Anyway, I got to thinking about all those bodies stuffed into glass boxes when I saw this:

आज दुनिया की आबादी 8 अरब हो गई, इस उपलब्धि को हासिल करने में ऐसे इंसानों को बहुत बड़ा योगदान रहा है👇 pic.twitter.com/Fiq62o0OiK

— Jaiky Yadav (@JaikyYadav16) November 15, 2022

How many people can ride a bicycle built for one? I don’t know whether the limit is nine.  Then again, I’m not sure I want to know!

Abandonment

 About three weeks ago, after a long day of work and errands, I was pedaling home when I flatted.

Rain and darkness were falling. I decided I’d rather fix my flat at home than on the street.  So I took the subway.

While waiting for the train, I saw this:

I’ve seen other shoes on the track bed. None were in as good condition, let alone as vibrantly colored.

Oh, and I’ve never seen another  shoe stand so prominently and conspicuously in its surroundings, in a trackbed or anywhere else.

It, of course, begs the question of how it got there, in such good shape and standing as proudly. Was it placed there deliberately?  If so, for what purpose?  So someone like me could babble about it on her blog?

Or was some street performer fleeing from law enforcement?  Perhaps he or she was playing Jean Valjean in a modern update of Les Miserables.  I mean, why not the New York City subways instead of the Paris sewers?

I haven’t been back to that station:  Cortlandt Street/World Trade Center on the R line.  So, of course, I don’t expect to see that shoe again. I hope, though don’t expect that it’s reunited with its mate—and, perhaps, the foot that dropped it!

She Survived Kyiv—But Not Bethesda

 In 2020, I crashed and was “doored” barely three months apart. A few people asked whether I’d give up cycling.  A couple said I should.  But, as I pointed out, I had been a dedicated cyclist for nearly half a century, with no mishaps that caused serious injuries, before those experiences.  Other people drove for less time and had more serious accidents but didn’t give up driving.

A cycling calamity cost Dan Langenkamp even more than both of my crashes cost me, because the price he paid is permanent.  

He was a press attaché and spokesperson for the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv.  His wife, Sarah, was a diplomat. They cycled in and around the city with their son, to work and school and for pleasure. Cycling had been such a part of their lives that Sarah gave him a bicycle with the words “It’s been a great ride!” painted on it.

Along with other Americans, they were evacuated from Ukraine when Vladimir Putain’s, I mean Putin’s, forces invaded the country. They returned to Bethesda, Maryland and worked in nearby Washington, DC.  They continued their bicycle-centered lifestyle until August, when Dan and Sarah were riding home from an open house at their kids’ elementary school. 

A flatbed truck made à right turn. The driver “wasn’t looking,” Dan said.  He made it home but she didn’t.  That truck “crushed” Sarah. He used that word to convey the “violence “ of what happened.  “It was as if the war followed us,” he lamented.

He’s since left his State Department job to advocate for “road safety.”  He understands that agitating for “bike safety “ or “driver awareness” is not enough.  Better road and lane design is also necessary.  So are safety features on trucks, he notes.

He is beginning his campaign today, with a bike rally which includes a ride that will re-trace Sarah’s last.

People in his life have asked him whether he thinks about not riding anymore. Some have implored him to do so.  Of course, he won’t.  Giving up cycling because of bad, careless or malicious drivers, he insists, would be “like changing your life because of terrorists.”

Mary Louise Kelly did a sensitive interview with Dan that aired yesterday: