Seeing Myself, Seeing Themselves In Alex

 Last month, I wrote two posts--"The Unbearable Whiteness of Cycling" and "Our Bodies, Our Bikes"--in which I describe how some people are discouraged from bicycling because they don't see themselves represented in images of cycling and cyclists.  Too often, ads and other media show only certain types of people astride bikes.  Usually, they are young and Caucasian--and thin, especially if they are female.  By implication, the folks depicted in those images are, or seem to be, middle-to-upper class professionals or living on trust funds.

And they all seem to fit cultural notions of gender and sexuality as well as they fit the "lifestyle" apparel they wear.  The women might be fit, even somewhat muscular, but they always fit into  standards of femininity and attractiveness of their milieu.  The men likewise fit into their society's ideas of masculinity.  Nowhere does one find any hit of gender non-conformity or "queerness."

In those posts, I also mentioned that I nearly gave up cycling when I started my gender-affirmation process because while I saw dudes on bikes who looked something like the guy named Nick I was--and images of men like that--I didn't see many of middle-aged women and, although I had mental images of the woman I wanted to be, I really had no idea of what I'd actually become, other than a woman named Justine, and whether she would be anything like any of the few women I saw on bikes.  

That, after I spent much of my life cycling--and some of my youth participating in other sports--in an attempt to fit into those notions of masculinity (and heterosexuality) represented, not only in bike-related ads and art, but in the general culture.  And, I must say that I fit in, at least somewhat:  I got respect in my circles of bike riders and other athletes as well as from teachers and professors.  Sometimes I was teased for not bragging about sexual conquests of girls or women, but the taunts could be taken only so far when the taunters and teasers saw me beside a woman.

Now, I've been talking about seeing myself, or one's self in images of cycling and cyclists.  While I am referring to visual and graphic ones, I am not referring only to them:  I know how much all of us--gay, straight, trans, cis, male, female, White, Black, Asian, Hispanic, Pacific/Alaskan Native, rich, poor, or whatever--need to hear our stories echoed, or at least paralleled, in the ones told in books, magazines and newspapers, or on websites, radio, television, film or podcasts.

Alex Showerman in the White Mountains of New Hampshire

That is why I had a brief catharsis in reading about Alex Showerman.  As much as she excelled as a cyclist, as well as in other sports and in school,  "I was not experiencing the world as I wanted to, and the world didn't see me as I wanted to be seen."  This sense of isolation and alienation led to depression, which she tried to numb with alcohol.

In 2015, she began seeing a gender therapist to make sense of who she is.  Last July,  on a bike trip in New Hampshire with two of her closest friends, she "came out" for the first time.  She never felt so free, she said:  She finally could ride just for the love of riding rather than to "outrun her shadows," as a Bicycling article put it, or to pound herself into maleness, as I tried to do.

I am happy that she has begun to live as her true self a decade and a half earlier in her life than I did in mine--and that she realizes that life includes cycling.  She might become the cyclist in an image in which some young trans girl or boy--or other gender or sexual non-conformist--sees him-, her- or them-self for the first time.

Cycling While Black, I Mean, Without A License

You've probably seen them:  groups of kids, almost always boys, weaving their bikes in and out of traffic lanes, veering across center lines and riding as close as they can to oncoming cars.  Sometimes, they're popping wheelies as they're zigging and zagging along the pavement.

When I see such groups, if I can catch the gaze of one of their members, I might yell, "Be careful, OK" or simply give them what I believe is a concerned but nonjudgmental look.  Kids need to be kids and, truth be told, I did more than a few stupid and dangerous things.  But I want them to be able to look back and reflect on, well, the stupid and dangerous things they got away with doing.

If cops are going to deal with them, they should stop to the kids and talk to them.  They might continue what they were doing as soon as the cops are out of sight, but I think the cops should at least make them think.  Ticketing--or, worse, arresting--them on bogus charges probably will accomplish nothing more than to make them more distrustful of authority, and defiant, than they already are.

Especially if the charge is one that has never been levied in the history of the kids' community.  

That is what happened last week in Perth Amboy, New Jersey--a city connected to Staten Island, New York by the Outerbridge Crossing.  I occasionally ride through it as I'm pedaling to other parts of New Jersey and I rode in and through it fairly often when I was a student at Rutgers.

Then, the majority of Perth Amboy residents were poor or working-class Hispanics, and there was a sizable Black community.  In that sense, it hasn't changed, save for which Hispanic and Black people live there.  Also not changed is the relationship between the people and the ones who police them.

An already high tension level has ratcheted up during the past year, in the wake of George Floyd's murder and other crimes and misdeeds by police officers against non-white people.  Things could have reached a breaking point--and might, still--after videos surfaced of the police confiscating the bikes and handcuffing one of the boys--who happens to be African American.

The charge--riding while black, I mean, without a bicycle license. I'd love to know when was the last time, before last week, that law was enforced.

 

Afternoon Nourishment

Over the past week or two, clouds have blanketed, and rain has fallen on, this part of the world more often than the sun has shone.  But the days have grown noticeably longer:  Every day, it seems, the sun sets a few minutes later.

That means I can start early in the afternoon and still get a decent ride in.  On Monday, I rambled along local streets and roads to the North Shore and central Queens to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park.  

The cherry blossoms were, well, not quite blossoms, not yet.  But the buds were visibly more open than they were over the weekend: open enough that I could envision the pink canopy the grove will soon provide.

I deliberately used the word "provide" because such sensual spectacles are sustenance for me:  They sustain me on my journey and the journey.

The following day, I didn't see cherry blossoms after I pedaled a few miles from my apartment.  I pedaled north and east, across the RFK Bridge into the Bronx and Westchester--into Connecticut.  I realize now that the difference in latitude, however slight, may have been enough to make a difference in the blooms:  Festivals in Washington, DC and much of Japan happen early in April (or even late March) because their trees, at a more southerly latitude, are exposed to the necessary sunlight, and therefore bloom, earlier.

I did, however, enjoy a snack or late light lunch*, depending on how you look at it, by a bed of tulips:

The soldiers, sailors and flyers commemorated at the Greenwich Memorial aren't buried there. Throughout my life, as I've become increasingly anti-war, I have become more pro-veteran.  Maybe I still have the hope that one day, whether or not it happens during my lifetime, no one else will have to do what they did--and that beauty can flourish in the ruins.

All right, enough faux-profound commentary.  It was great to start after noon and finish a 145 kilometer ride well before dark--and to chow down on some Italian American soul food--baked ziti and salad--after feeding my apartment mate.**

*--A quarter of a whole wheat baguette with Brad's peanut butter and Bonne Maman preserves--cherry on half, wild blueberry on the other half.

**--I always feed Marlee before I feed myself.  I got into the habit of feeding my cat(s) first years ago, with my first feline companion.