I came across this infographic from Bike Philadlephia. It compares bicyclists in the City of Brotherly Love to those of other cities.
Actually, I like it as much for its design as for the information in it!
Today, in one of the college's bike racks, I saw something interesting:
I apologize that I couldn't get take a better photo. But, as you can see, it's a small-wheeled bike that doesn't have a folding or collapsible frame. It seems like a variant on the "Shopper" bike, which Bobbin and a few other companies have re-introduced during the last couple of years.
The medium-wide semi-slick tires are what one might expect to see on a city bike. And the bike's low profile makes for quick mounting and dismounting. Those features were common on the "shopper" bikes Raleigh and a few other English companies made during the 1960's and 1970's. Those bikes were very popular in Albion, but didn't seem to find much of an audience anywhere else. I think one reason may be that, in the US at any rate, people equated the small wheels with folding or children's bikes.
The bike in the photo differs slightly from those bikes, and from the Bobbin "shopper" I saw at Adeline's and in last year's New Amsterdam bike show. For one thing, the Bobbin, like the classic "shopper," comes with an internally-geared hub, while the bike in the photo has a rear derailleur with six speeds. Also, the Bobbin and the older bikes had fenders, chainguards and lights: They looked rather like classic three-speeds with smaller wheels and a somewhat tighter geometry.
Also, the bike in the photo has white(!) rims and chain. Could the maker (I could find only a "C" logo) be trying to appeal to hipsters? Even if that's the intent, I think it's an interesting bike. I was surprised to see it parked at the college. Then again, it might be just the right bike for a lot of student commuters or for students on residential campuses. In other words, it just might become a "collegiate" bike.
One day, I was talking with someone I admired as an artist and took as a kind of spiritual adviser. (I was young then.) I asked her what she wanted most.
I was expecting something deep and profound--or, at least, something that would have sounded deep and profound to me back then. (I think it was around the time I read Herman Hesse's Steppenwolf and Siddhartha.) Here's what she said:
A simple life and innocent times.
Now, at the time I thought neither was possible--and, that, in fact, they were marketing tropes. Yep, you can live the simple life if you can afford it, and you can have innocent times if your world is, well, a simple place. The truth is, of course, that I never could have had innocent times because I wasn't so innocent and times were never simple because I was simpler than I was willing to acknowledge.
But I digress. For the first time in decades, I thought of that encounter when I stumbled across this photo:
I can just imagine unrolling what's strapped to the saddle and unfurling myself on it, in a field where I might fill the basket on the front of the bike:
I guess there are actually people who live that way. Goddess bless 'em. (Hey, changing genders turned me into a feminist!)
Both photos come from the lovely blog A Serene Life For Me.
