What's On A Rider's Mind?

 I am posting today's image for the benefit for any non-cyclist who might be riding.

If you are such a reader, you might have wondered what's on a cyclist's mind near the end of a long, hot, arduous ride.

I am here to tell, or rather, show you:

After Tom...

So you have that bike someone in your family brought bike from an overseas tour of duty. Or you have a Bike Boom era ten-speed you still ride--or want to pass on or simply don't want to give up.  Maybe you're holding on (and still riding) that beatiful machine from your racing days or the one that took you across a state or continent, and you want to keep it going for everyday riding or eroica-type events.

Sometimes you can replace old parts with modern ones.  They may not have the style of the stuff the bike came with, but they--especially derailleurs--might work better.  Other times, though, new parts simply won't fit or just won't look right on the old bike.

So what do you do?

These days, you can peruse eBay and other sites.  The Internet is also useful for learning about swap meets and the like.  But one often-overlooked source is the old "family" bike shops that have been in the same location for decades.  Folks in bike costumes with four-digit price tags astride bikes with five-figure tabs might turn up their noses (which, I admit, are often better turned-out than mine!) at such places.  But they often have freewheels, for example, or chainrings in bolt-circle diameters no longer made--or small parts for Mafac or Weinmann caliper--or Bendix or New Departure coaster--brakes.  

And, of course, such shops are called "family" shops because families are not only their owners, but their customer base.  The world-champion racer, globe-spanning tourer and the lifelong everyday cyclist almost invariably started riding as children, whether alone to school, with friends at a local dirt track or family at the park.  Those mom-and-pop proprietors and their employees don't get nearly enough recognition for the role they play in initiating the young into cycling and nurturing a cycling culture.

Tom Anderson, the retiring owner of The Bicycle Rack in Muskegon, Michgian.  (Photo by Cory Morse for MLive.

Tom Anderson of Muskegon, Michigan is such a proprietor.  For 46 years, he's catered to "the mom and pop, the bread and butter of bicycling"  in the western Michigan community.  At one time, the showroom of his shop, The Bicycle Rack, brimmed with 150 or more bikes of all kinds, from kids' trikes to high-end racers.  But like too many other small shops, he hasn't been able to re-stock bikes--or even parts--as the COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted production and supply chains.  

So now the lifelong Muskegon resident--who helped to spearhead the 12-mile Lakeshore Bike Trail on Lake Muskegon--is closing his shop and retiring. He considered selling his business, he said, but the next owner would have faced the same struggles that have confronted him.  Truth is, nobody knows when the bike business--or anything else--will "go back to normal," whatever that will mean.

When folks like Tom close up their shops, it doesn't mean only that there's one less place to buy or fix a bike.  Shop owners like him build relationships with people in their communities.  Even if they don't grow up to be dedicated cyclists, they fondly remember folks like him and his willingness to help. Oh, and where else--besides eBay--are you going to find that original lever for your 1950's English three-speed or French-threaded freewheel--without paying eBay prices?

And how can you not miss someone who says of his life's work, "I loved every minute of it"?

A Ride Before Earth Day

 Today is Earth Day.

This day was first designated in 1970, a year after the Santa Barbara oil spill.  I remember growing up with a great awareness of the environmental movement.  Because of that and the Jacques Cousteau television series that aired at the time, for a time I wanted to become a marine ecologist. They also watered, if you'll pardon the metaphor, the seed that had already been planted for my cycling enthusiasm.

I remembered that yesterday, during a late-afternoon ride.  I had no particular destination:  I zigzagged along Queens and Brooklyn streets, past bridges and brownstones, parks and pre-schools, international neighborhoods and industrial colonies. And this:

It's hard to believe, but this was once the most fertile oyster bed in the world.  Lenape natives literally picked them up from the banks and roasted them with the corn, beans and squash they grew nearby.  Now a sign admonishes visitors not to eat anything from that water, or even to enter it.  Every year for as long as I've been paying attention, the Environmental Agency has rated Newtown Creek, which separates the metal fabricators, cement plants and truck depots of Maspeth, Queens from East Williamsburg, Brooklyn, as one of the most polluted bodies of water in the United States.  Sometimes it takes the "top" spot. 

Cycling has helped me to appreciate the beauty of landscapes, natural and manmade.  It also reminds me of. not only the need to preserve such places, but to use what we've built wisely and resposibly.