In the middle of the journey of my life, I am--as always--a woman on a bike. Although I do not know where this road will lead, the way is not lost, for I have arrived here. And I am on my bicycle, again.
If you bought a Raleigh bicycle before the 1970s, it might have come with this:
Even if you have never owned a Raleigh, there's a good chance that you've come across the Raleigh spanner (or what Yanks call "wrench"). You might even have one. I did, for a long time. I don't know whether I loaned it and never got it back, or simply lost it.
Anyway, Raleigh wasn't the only British bike maker to offer a spanner. Check out this, from Claud Butler:
Like Raleigh's tool, the Claud Butler spanner has a hooked end for a bottom bracket lock ring. I am guessing that the hex side of the wrench fit the bottom bracket cup--or, possibly, the headset. In the 1960s--when, it seems, the tool in the photo was made--if a customer bought a frame, it was as often as not supplied with those components.
Claud Butler is long gone, and bikes under his name, and Holdsworth, have been made by other British bicycle manufacturers for some time. CB also offers a line of tools similar to those of other bike manufacturers, but when Claud was still alive, they had their own discrete line, which were probably made by Cyclo or some other Birmingham bike parts company.
I have just taken an easy ride through the heart of Queens, to the far end of the borough and the near end of Nassau County. It's Sunday, and the blaze autumn colors will soon turn into the ashes of fall, the foreshadowings of winter. I think I took the ride more for the opportunity to reflect on a few things than I did to exert myself physically. I do that sometimes, especially at this time of year. For me, there is something paradoxically clear and benevolent at the same time about the nip in the air and the light of days growing shorter. There have been seasons that ended with my wishing that I had ridden more, harder or to different places. I feel no such yearnings now. Of course, having the opportunity to cycle in Florida, Paris and Montreal, as well as taking rides from my place to Connecticut and various points in New Jersey and Long Island has given me kaleidoscope of images to take with me through the winter. I don't plan to stop cycling: I never do that except, perhaps, for physical injuries or ailments (which, thankfully, I don't experience often) or when there's a lot of ice on the streets, as there was through much of last winter. But, realistically, I know that I won't cycle as much between, say, Thanksgiving and March or whenever the weather breaks. Today I was satisfied, no, I was happy with the riding I did this year. Perhaps I could have ridden even more, but I don't wish that I did. I also don't wish that I had the strength and stamina I did when I was younger. Well, all right, I'd like to have those things, but I know I don't need them to keep on riding, to continue my journey.
As I rode today, I was thinking about a particular ride I took many, many years ago. I had taken the day off from working as a messenger, hopped onto my Peugeot PX-10E and pedaled across the bridge, up and down ridges, and back up some old mining roads in the Watchung Mountains. The cloud cover was not a shawl that kept the ridges and cliffs warm and forgetful; rather, it seemed to keep the chill and ashen tones of the coming winter all around, and within, me. I had, in not much more than a year, experienced the deaths of two of my closest (emotionally and spiritually) relatives and the suicide of a friend. There was nothing to do but pedal up that steep mining road; it could have been the last thing I did; I wanted it to be; there would be no wishes, no regrets left. But no matter how hard I pedaled or how fast I ascended that hill, the young man I was could not have met up with the woman I am now. If he could have, I would have told him that he would be OK, he is riding, he is on his journey, it was all that mattered. In short, I could not have understood what it would be like to have taken the ride I have taken to where I am now.
In an earlier post, I wrote about one of the great paradoxes of sports: Some countries, particularly in Europe, that are cycling hotbeds are also powerhouses in what they call "football" or Americans call "soccer". Yet one never sees anyone who competes--at least at a high level--in both sports. That is all the more perplexing when one realizes that the skills and training for both sports are, in some many ways, similar.
In that post from a year and half ago, I posited that some of the reasons why the twain rarely, if ever, meet between the worlds of cycling and football because their seasons are more or less concurrent, both sports require intensive training to the exclusion of almost everything else (at least, if one wants to compete at an elite level) and that cyclists, even when they ride for teams, are competing mainly for individual honors while football is all about the team.
Peter Sagan of Slovakia is one of cycling's great young talents: Just a few weeks ago, the 25-year-old won the men's road race of the UCI championships. He has also won the points classification of the Tour de France and other races, and has a number of stage victories. Not many people would be surprised, I think, if he wins the Tour--or the Giro d'Italia, Vuelta a Espana or other major multi-stage races over the next few years.
More surprising might be a switch to a professional football career. Or would it?
