Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's Day.  I extend this wish, not only to those of you who are male parents, but to any of you who have taught a child--or any young person--important life lessons and skills.

Since you're reading this blog, you probably agree that the most important skill--or, at least, one of the most important skills is riding a bicycle.  So for those of you who stayed with some kid until she or he learned how to pedal while balancing on two wheels, I offer this, from World of Wander on Etsy New Zealand:

Most of you would probably agree that one of the most important lessons is the knowledge of right from wrong.  Many of you, I'm sure, learned that at least in part from your fathers:

Finally, some of you would argue that the most important thing that your fathers imparted to you--and perhaps the thing you share most as adults--is beer.  (Such is not the case for my father:  He--thankfully--has never been much of a drinker.)  If your father loves bikes and beers, you might want to give him this:

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't end this post without mentioning the film that shows, more than any other that I am aware of, just how a bicycle can bring a father and child together.  


That film, of course, is the monumental Ladri di Biciclette:



I hope that it doesn't take the theft of your, or anyone else's, bike to bring you and your father (or, for that matter, mother) together!

Even Max Couldn't Bear To Look At Me!

Yesterday, the weather forecast said today the skies would be "partly cloudy-to-sunny" and whatever chance we'd have for rain would come late tonight or in the early hours of tomorrow morning.  When I woke up this morning, the sky looked heavier and grayer than I expected it to be.  I turned on the radio.  Sure enough, the forecast had changed to "occasional rain and drizzle."

So I figured I could get out before one of the occasions and, if I got caught in one, I could ride or wait it out.  Although a fairly cool day for this time of year, I wouldn't have minded getting caught in a shower, especially a light one.

Including my "beater" (the Schwinn LeTour), I have three bikes with fenders.  Reason and logic would have dictated taking one of them.  But, I have one of those lives in which not much is dictated by reason or logic.  So, of course, I took one of my fenderless bikes--Tosca, my Mercian fixie, to be exact.

Needless to say, I did get caught in one of the meteorological "occasions" that was forecast. I rode through it, and another.  Not surprisingly, I ended up with some dirt and mud spattered on the wheels, frame and seat and handlebar bags (which cleaned up surprisingly easily). 

Unless I've had a particularly long or hard ride, or I simply don't have time, I clean my bike before I clean myself.  It's not that I care more about my bikes' than my own appearance (although I think my bikes are far more capable of looking good than I am!).  Rather, I always thought that it didn't make sense to take a shower, then to get dirty again when cleaning my bike.

After giving Tosca her wipe-down, I turned toward the sofa and saw Max:

Hmm...Maybe I was grungier than I thought I was!

Massacre In South Carolina: The Confederate Flag Still Flies

Today I’m not going to stick to the topic of this blog.  Instead, I want to talk about something that, I’m sure, you’ve heard about by now:  the massacre inside the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina .

One of the cruelest ironies is that members of a Bible study group—including the church's pastor, who also happens to be a  South Carolina State senator—in one of America’s oldest historically black churches were gunned down by a young white man who sat with them on the eve of Juneteenth— a few days after the 800^th anniversary of King John issuing Magna Carta.

And the Confederate Flag flies in front of the State Capitol.

A century and a half after slaves in South Carolina and Texas and other states got word that they were free men and women, a young man hadn’t gotten the message that the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution guarantees all citizens, regardless of their skin color, the rights enumerated in the first ten amendments (a.k.a. the Bill of Rights).  Heck, he didn’t even get the message that there’s no such country as Rhodesia anymore.  He was simply acting from the same sort of ignorance, the same sort of hate, that left earlier generations of young African Americans hanging from trees or at the bottoms of rivers.

And the Confederate Flag flies in front of the State Capitol.

More than a century and a half after the Emancipation Proclamation, in the state in which the opening shot of the US Civil War was fired, a young man entered a Bible Study group and waited for the “right” moment to shoot someone nearly as young as he is, people old enough to be his parents, grand-parents and great-grandparents.  He shattered the peace and sanctity they found in what, for many generations of African-Americans—and, perhaps, for those members of the Bible Study group—has been their closest-knit, if not their only, sanctuary.

And the Confederate flag flies in front of the State Capitiol.   

From the church's website.

A pastor was killed along with a deacon and laypeople.  Families lost sisters, brothers, mothers, fathers; friends lost friends and people lost spouses and other loved ones.  They loved and were loved; they raised families and were raised by families.  And they contributed to the lives of their communities through their professional and volunteer work, and the loves and interests they shared with those around them.

And the Confederate flag flies in front of the State Capitol.

Dylann Storm Roof, in an instant, ended the lives of Rev. (and Sen.) Clementa Pickney, Mira Thompson, Daniel Simmons Sr., Cynthia Hurd, Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Tywanza Sanders, De Payne Middleton, Ethel Lance and her cousin Susie Jackson. All of them, one hundred and fifty years after Juneteenth.

And a Confederate flag in front of the State Capitol hasn't even been lowered to half-mast.