What Did It Cost?

Whenever anyone asks what my bikes cost, I find a way not to answer.  Muttering "none of your business" is a sure signal that it's expensive; so is replying with "Why do you ask?"

Then again, I am a New Yorker who lived in the Big Apple during the '80's and early '90's, when crime of all kinds was rampant.  I remember pre-hipster Williamsburg and when the Lower East Side really was "lower" in more ways than one.  Each of those neighborhoods bookends the Williamsburg Bridge which, even before the bike lane was reconstructed, was the best way to cross the East River by bicycle.

Apparently, some criminals knew as much.  Or, at least, they knew that in-the-know cyclists preferred (and still prefer) "Billyburg" to the Brooklyn, Manhattan or Queesnboro (59th Street) Bridges.  And, they knew that in-the-know cyclists were riding the most valuable bikes.  

You can guess what happened:  A few cyclists I knew, and quite a few more I didn't know, were attacked for their bikes on either side of the bridge.  In fact, an employee of one shop I frequented had his machine stolen just days after he bought it--and that after working more than a year to save up for it. 

Somehow I don't think those riders told anyone--certainly, not random strangers-- what their bikes cost. But then again, they didn't have to:  Such information is easy enough to find.

This leads me to wonder whether the advice given by police in Roodespoort, South Africa will be helpful to the bike shop owners who received it--or, more important, customers of said establishments.

The gendarmes told the pedal purveyors--you guessed it--not to disclose the prices of their most expensive bikes with the media.   They shared their sage wisdom after a cyclist was robbed and shot for his bike in the Kromdraai area of the city.  

Medics carrying the injured cyclist.

That cyclist is alive only because of the efforts of a Good Samaritan who heard his cries for help and stopped.  "They had shot him twice in the leg and in the back," said Jon-Jon Pietersen who had only a rubber glove, a towel and box tape.  

Fortunately for the cyclist, more people stopped by and helped until the ambulance arrived, 20 minutes later.

Is A Picture Worth A Thousand Words When It Gives Us Two?

As The World's Only Transgender Bike Blogger (at least, the only one I know about!), you can understand why this got my attention:

From bikechaser

Well, all right, the colors are hard to miss.   But the design is not exactly to my taste (at least, not anything I'd wear).  What piqued my interest were the words:  "Femme" (woman) on the jersey, "Homme" (man) on the shorts.

Hmm....

At Least He Survived--We Hope

Some stories bring me no joy.  But sometimes I feel the need to tell them, if only because they hit close to home.

At least this one hasn't ended in tragedy...so far.

A few days ago, I wrote about Madison Jane Lyden, the Australian tourist run down by an inebriated garbage truck driver as she cycled up Central Park West.  Well, I've gotten word of another cyclist struck by a motorist on a route I ride frequently.

Just before  8 pm yesterday, an 11-year-old boy (whose name hasn't been released) was riding his bike in Far Rockaway, in an area I pass through when I ride to Point Lookout or other points on Long Island's South Shore.  Occasionally, "Far Rock" is even my destination, especially when I'm trying to get a ride in during an abbreviated winter day.  




Anyway, a black sedan slammed into him--and kept going.  The impact sent him airborne for several car lengths. He landed in the hospital with internal injuries, but he is expected to survive.

At least, according to the NYPD, the driver of that car--41-year-old Aghostinho Sinclair--has been arrested.  Needless to say he's in a heap of trouble: The charges against him include reckless endangerment, leaving the scene of an accident--and driving without a license. (The latter charge is called "aggravated unlicensed operation".)  I wonder whether "endangering the welfare of a child" or some similar charge can be added to the list. 

Judaism And The Art Of Bicycle Riding

If you're of a certain age, as we say, there's a good chance you've read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.  Some English classes--including a few at the college I attended--actually assigned it.  I escaped that fate:  I didn't have to take the English classes that assigned it because, when I entered my college, the person (or folks) in charge of placement decided that I was a better writer than I actually was, based on an essay I wrote as part of my entrance exam.  

I did, however, read Zen on my own.  I didn't expect to learn how to fix motorcycles or about Zen.  If I recall correctly, the book's author, Robert Pirsig, included a disclaimer advising readers not to have such expectations.  Even if he'd intended to instruct his readers on how to wrench their rice rockets (That was a term for Japanese motorcycles, which were much lighter than Harleys.) or meditate, I'm not sure of what I might've learned because, really, I had little idea about motorcycles except that my uncle rode one or about Buddhism save for guys in orange robes.

I'm not sure of what, if anything, I learned from the book.  That's not to say it wasn't worth reading:  At that point in my life, I was a sucker for stories about folks who left jobs, families and other bourgeois expectations behind, even if only for a time, to traverse the country or world, mainly because--you guessed it--I wanted to do something like that.  

Pirsig's prose had little, if any, stylistic grace.  He probably wouldn't have wanted to have any--which, I believe, was part of the appeal of his book.  You don't quote him the way you would, say, Thoreau, let alone Virginia Woolf or Shakespeare. (About my friend Bill:  I remember reading that some researcher found that the average English speaker quotes him at least 20 times a day, mostly without realizing  he or she has done so!)  But I remember this:  "The real motorcycle you're working on is yourself."  Or something like that.

So, what aphorisms can one glean from an experience of Judiasm and the Art of Bicycle Riding?  It's hard not to think that Abigail Pogrebin, the author of an article by that name, didn't read, or at least hear of, Pirsig's volume.  And she indeed reveals a thing or two she learned about herself from riding a mountain bike through Arizona brush--with a Native American guide named George. And, oh, her rabbi.

The irony is, as she says, that George imparted so much Jewish wisdom.  In particular, he offered this nugget that could have come straight from Moses (who, in my mind, always looks and sounds like Charlton Heston):

Always look way ahead of you.  Never look down.  As soon as you look down, you will hesitate, overthink, negotiate, get stuck.  Always be moving into the future. Bike into the future.

The last two sentences, she admits, can sound pretty corny, but, as Ms. Pogebrin points out, "How many times does our tradition ask us to 'go forth'? How many times in our history have we had to keep going despite what's thrown in our way?"  There is no other choice, really:  By definition, we can only move toward the future.  Living in what I call the Eternal Present--and I've known lots of people who've done, and who do, exactly that--is a pretty good definition of a living death.

But, of course, George wasn't trying to be rabbinical.  As Pogrebin learned, his admonitions were entirely literal:  "Once we were out on the trails, as soon as we looked down, we were screwed--the bike suddenly spun out of control, stalled in a mud crevice or jammed its tires between rocks."  When her rabbi and two other cyclists who accompanied them--a couple of guys from San Francisco--navigated a stretch on which she stumbled, George bellowed "GO BACK AND DO IT AGAIN, ABBY!"  But then he imparted what was probably the most important lesson of all, at least for her:

You're too clenched, too focused on getting it right.  You're not trusting the bike or the path.  Keep your eyes ahead and trust that you'll get where you need to go.  Breathe all the way there.

"Breathe all the way there."  Funny, how Zen that sounds to me. But it probably could have come from her rabbi--or anyone who understands that it's all a journey, and the bike is the vehicle.  That, as I recall, is also one of the messages of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

(If Abigail Pogrebin's name looks familiar to you, it means one of two things:  You watched Ed Bradlees 60 Minutes segments, for which she was a writer and producer. Or, you read Ms. magazine, of which her mother, Letty was a founder and editor.  I'm guilty on both counts.)

Keeping It Light

Today I am going to pose a question that never, ever would have occurred to me had I not seen the photo in this post.

And you probably never would have asked had I not mentioned it.

Here goes:  Do emperors take vacations?

From Freaking News

I haven't been to Elba, but I hear the beaches are really nice there.  So are the ones on Corisca!