Some of us pine for our youth---or at least some parts of it.
Me, I wouldn't want to have to live it again as someone for whom the "M" box was checked off on her birth certificate. But I wouldn't mind doing, again, some of the things I did in those times. And I certainly would be happy to be in the kind of physical shape I was in for the fifteen or so years before my gender transition.
At age 40, I was something of a hero to the guys with whom I used to ride, some of whom were about half my age. For a time, I was riding my Land Shark with 56-42 chainrings and an 11-21 nine-speed cassette. And my knees never hurt. Nothing ever felt stiff, either.
But I had nothing on whoever rode this bike:
Now, whoever that person is, his or her mechanical skills didn't match his or her riding abilities-- or that person had a terrible mechanic: The front fork is on backward.
Then again, perhaps it was meant to be. After all, someone would ride with such a big chainring only for a motor-paced record attempt. For such a ride, the cyclist would want the shortest wheelbase possible and the lowest possible amount of air resistance.
I don't know who might have ridden this bike or what record he or she might have broken. But, from what I can see, the chainring has 124 teeth!
If I were to offer advice to the young, one thing I'd tell is that they should look forward to getting older because the statute of limitations runs out.
Thus, I can admit to having done some riding in my youth after intaking substances that may or may not be banned by the UCI and WADA, if not Federal and State authorities.
Thankfully, there are many more substances with influences under which I never rode. For that matter, I never took any of those drugs. I have to wonder, though, what it was like to ride under the influence of what Albert Hofmann took before his ride home on 19 April 1943.
Herr Hofmann had synthesized several derivatives of ergot, a fungus found on rye, in search of a new stimulant drug to induce childbirth. He accidentally ingested a small amount of his 25th derivative while synthesizing it, and recorded the effects thusly:
“… affected by a remarkable restlessness, combined with a slight dizziness. At home I lay down and sank into a not unpleasant intoxicated-like condition, characterized by an extremely stimulated imagination. In a dreamlike state, with eyes closed (I found the daylight to be unpleasantly glaring), I perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors. After some two hours this condition faded away.”
Three days later, on the 19th, he intentionally took 0.25 milligrams--what he believed to be the "threshold dose"--of his new drug. However, he soon realized that he had greatly underestimated its potency. Within an hour, he was experiencing vast shifts in his mental perceptions. Because of wartime vehicular restrictions, he asked his lab assistant to escort him home by bicycle.
After he awoke on his couch and his physician assured him that he indeed had not been poisoned, he recorded his "trip":
“… little by little I could begin to enjoy the unprecedented colors and plays of shapes that persisted behind my closed eyes. Kaleidoscopic, fantastic images surged in on me, alternating, variegated, opening and then closing themselves in circles and spirals, exploding in colored fountains, rearranging and hybridizing themselves in constant flux…”
By now, you probably realize that what Hofmann made and ingested was not one of today's energy bars or Red Bull. It was Lysergic Acid Diethylamide-25, or what we now call LSD or "Acid".
Trippers and stoners today refer to 19 April as Bicycle Day, in honor of the world's first "acid trip". (I would argue that the first trip was actually experienced, and recorded, by the author(s) of the Book of Revelations.) Hofmann had never dreamed of such a thing, or the late 1960s Haight-Ashbury scene, for he had envisioned his drug as an aid to psychotherapy: Its "intense and introspective nature", as he described it, would limit its popular appeal.
Note: In writing this I am not endorsing the use of LSD-25 or any other hallucinogen or banned substance, whether or not I used them in my long-ago youth!
"I have great respect for you, ma'am. Anyone who rides today deserves 'props'!"
A security guard said that as I was locking up my bike at work. The flurries that fluttered onto my helmet about five minutes into my commute had turned into harder, though not driving, snow. Some of it was starting to accumulate, but I wasn't worried because the forecasts called for no more than an inch. Plus, I knew that even if there were more on my way home, some of the streets would be plowed by that time.
It's funny that our first snowfall of the season came just days after I put a pair of Panaracer Tour tires, with thick but not knobby treads, on the LeTour. In case you were wondering: Yes, I rode to work in a skirt. But I was wearing fairly thick black tights under it. On my feet, I wore my black LL Bean duck boots and carried my heels in a bag.
It wasn't an exceptional winter ride or commute, really, although I enjoyed it. Still, whatever "props" that security guard gave me, I have nothing on these guys:
Now there's something I probably will never do: ride a penny-farthing in the snow. But I guess the guys in that photo didn't have a choice, as the "safety" bicycle hadn't been invented yet. And they were in Montreal. If you're can't or won't ride in the snow, it essentially means that you're not going to ride in The City Of A Hundred Steeples (as Mark Twain called it) during the winter.
