For many people, a quintessential childhood memory is one of finding a bicycle under the Christmas tree. One generation dreamed of a shiny Schwinn balloon-tired bikes; the next yearned for three-speed "English racers." Then there were those who lusted after slick-tired "Choppers" or "low-riders" or cruisers with sweeping curves--and, later, ten-speeds, which seemed as fast and exotic as sports cars.
If you've ever found a bicycle under the tree on Christmas morning, you know that nothing--not even getting that custom frame you'd been dreaming about--is ever quite as exciting. Perhaps things are different for the current generation, but for mine, and those that came earlier, a new bike was the ne plus ultra of rewards Santa (a.k.a., Mom, Dad or other adult) bestowed upon you for being a good little boy or good little girl. Not that I was ever either one... ;-] In fact, as an adult, I was once given a bike for Christmas for being naughty, if you know what I mean!
So, dear readers: I'd love to hear about the bikes you got, or gave, for the holidays.
They say it's bad luck when a black cat crosses your path. How does that affect you if you learn that as a kid? Well, I guess it could really screw up your race relations, or leave you with a pile of therapists' bills. The latter is a common consequence of being inculcated with just about any superstition.
For the record, I've paid all of my therapists' bills. That is not to be confused with paying your dues, if for no other reason that if you think you've paid your dues, you haven't. At least you know whether or not you've paid your therapists' bills. Trust me: I know from whence I speak!
Now I've really digressed. To get back to the subject of this post...which was? Oh, right, a black cat crossing your path. Well, one didn't cross my path today. However, this one crossed in front of me when I was riding on Randall's Island:
She's feral, so she doesn't stand still for very long. However, she did pause from her prowlings when I stopped. She tiptoed to within a few feet of me, gazed into my eyes and, perhaps realizing that I hadn't brought anything for her to eat, took off.
There's been some material written about how to deal with stray dogs when you're on your bike. But I have yet to see anything that deals with the subject of stray cats encountered when cycling.
I recall now the time I was pedaling up a narrow mountain road near Briancon, France. The surface and the sides looked sunbaked, even though the day was overcast. I'd just made one of those turns from which rocks tumble off the edge of the road when I heard--meowing? Here?, I wondered. There were no other animals and no vegetables, or so it seemed. Well, at least I knew that my soon-to-be new friend (who seemed to be a Chartreuse cat) didn't get skinny from smoking cigarettes and drinking black coffee.
I didn't have any cat food with me. However, I did have some butter cookies in my handlebar bag. I broke up a few and they seemed to end up in her mouth almost as soon as they passed through my hands.
From there, I cycled into Italy. Ironically, on the way back, I rode down the same road and the same cat crossed my path.
As hard as her life must have been, at least she had a wonderful view. So did the cat who came my way today:
Some black bike parts are said to have a "stealth" look. I suppose that on a black bike, they would "fly under the radar." And, if enough people are riding black bikes, I suppose that those "stealth" bikes and parts could go unnoticed.
But what if the world were lit by magenta neon? Seeing the old Rudge-Whitorth in that light in Flushing made me think of this: That bike, which was black, certainly didn't look "stealth." That's not to say I didn't like its looks: It had a nice patina on it, and there's something classy about some of those old three-speeds. But if one wanted to make it less visible, what would one do?
Would these be "stealth" in the light I saw last night?
Tonight, on my way home, I stopped in Flushing for a bite to eat. Now, I've never been to Hong Kong, but Flushing is what I imagine Hong Kong would be like if it were transported to Queens. Or, perhaps, with its ubiquitous neon, it could be seen as an Asian version of Times Square.
I wonder whether the makers of this Rudge-Whitworth ever imagined it in magenta neon light. In some odd way, bike and light are not incongruous, at least to me.
One particularly interesting feature of this bike is its chainring cutout pattern:
Is the hand halting or waving? Whatever it's doing, it looks good doing it on this bike.
I'm guessing that the bike is from the 1940's or 1950's. At that time there were dozens, if not hundreds, of bicycle manufacturers who made what we now think of as classic English 3-speeds. (Many of those companies, including Rudge, were bought by Raleigh during the 1950's.) While, at first glance, they seemed almost the same, each model had its own particular set of details that set it apart. An example is in the chainwheel you saw in the above photo. Many other British makers used chainwheels with interesting and sometimes whimsical patterns cut into them. The Raliegh three-speed I rode last year had a heron--Raleigh, which of course was Raleigh's corporate symbol.
I've seen other chainrings cut out in interesting patterns. Here's one of my favorites:
It's on an AJ Warrant bike from Austria. Although there's no earthly reason to use a cottered crankset today, I wouldn't mind having the one in the photo.
Last night my commute took me through the great wilderness of the Land of Overdecorated Houses.
Even after so many years of cycling, I still can't get over how much brighter and gaudier those lights and combinations of green, red, gold, silver tinfoil seem when you don't have two feet of glass and two tons of metal between you and them. And the cold, clear night made them glint and glare all the more, or so it seemed.
We're supposed to have more of this bonechilling clarity through the next week. I hear even Santa's reindeer don't want to come out in this weather. Hmm...I wonder...How would the world be a different place if Santa and his helpers rode bicycles instead of sleighs pulled by reindeer.
I've tried to get Charlie and Max interested in cycling. But they aren't interested in the hard work: They like to supervise.
Max, at least, makes an effort at looking busy. (Is that something like acting sincere? I actually heard someone say that.) Of course, there's no contract, but there are no rules about sleeping on the job. Charlie knows that very well:
It was below freezing and, with the wind chill, about fifteen degrees colder. I got on my bike to go to work. Now you tell me: Which species is more intelligent and evolved?
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| From Utility Cycling |
It is undeniably winter now. Or, at least, it feels that way. The winds of yesterday doth blew today. Hey, I'm teaching a Shakespeare play in one of my classes. You have trouble with Shakespeare's language, you say? All right: Ou sont les neiges d'antan?
What made today really strange, though, at least climatically (No, that's not the word you thought it was!), was the fact that the temperature varied almost not at all. It felt that way and the recap I heard of the day's weather said as much: High temp 34 F; Low Temp 30; clouds but no precip; wind speeds from 20 to 30 mph. Not a day fair and excellent, as the Bard would say.
It's time to get myself out of denial. Time to take out the wool gloves, the wool shirts and such. The week I'll spend in Florida will be a mere interlude: the cold will precede and follow it.
At least there hasn't been any sleet or slush yet. I don't mind the cold, and I don't mind precipitation. Both together, though, can make for miserable cycling and can be simply depressing. Fenders and the proper clothing make such conditions endurable, if not enjoyable.
I'm not about to stop riding, though. I never have gone on "winter break" unless I had some health issue or another that prevented me from cycling. That hasn't happened often, and has never kept me off my bike for more than a couple of weeks every winter.
At least winter rides make hot chocolate and soups taste really good!
Today I managed to get out only briefly. I got up late and had a few errands and other things to take care of. I wish I'd ridden more (Don't I always!) because it was a nice day, the cold and wind notwithstanding.
Actually, I wanted to ride more in part because of the wind. Of course, there are two sides of it: riding facefirst into it and having it blow at your back. The former is the stuff that builds character and such, the latter is a reward for, I suppose, having your character built up.
Pedaling into the wind is, even among non-cyclists, a poignant metaphor for facing challenges. Not being pushed back is a kind of progress; moving forward is a victory in the same way as surviving another day of a struggle. With these victories, with survival, comes the hope that accompanies the anticipation of a reward: the wind blowing at your back.
I did my first rides of more than an hour along the ocean in New Jersey. I would ride from Middletown, where I spent my high-school years, to Sandy Hook, which is exactly what the name says it is: a spit of sand that somehow manages not to be submerged by the bay or the ocean that are on each side of it. From there, I'd ride along Route 36 through Sea Bright and Monmouth Beach--both of which straddle strips of land even narrower than Sandy Hook--to Long Branch. (Later, as I gained more experience, I'd ride down to Asbury Park or beyond.)
On the peninsula that forms the West End of Long Branch, the wind shifted direction about two o'clock every afternoon. On most days, I would be riding into the wind down to Long Branch. That, of course, meant that the wind would blow me back home.
Learning about that wind shift, and how to use it, taught me much more than almost anything else I learned in high school--or any school, for that matter. It took me a long time to learn how to use those lessons, but they are the sorts of lessons one doesn't forget.
Those lessons were even applicable to those times when I had to continue pedaling into the same wind from which I had no respite on the previous day. There are times like that on most multi-day rides: I recall now the second tour I took in Europe, from Italy into France. Late one Saturday I checked into a small hotel in Brignoles, a place that was actually quite lovely and interesting (It is in Provence, after all.) but where I also hadn't any plans to stay. I stopped there because, by the end of that afternoon, I simply couldn't pedal any more. The next day was more of the same--wind and climbing punctuated by climbing and wind--but at least every pore, orifice and cell had been awakened by that previous day's ride.
And, oddly enough, while I was pedaling through those lavender-tinged hills, I began to chant part of a Navajo creation song to myself:
It was the wind that gave them life. It is the wind that comes out of our mouths now that gives us life. When this ceases to blow, we die. In the skin at the tips of our fingers, we can see the train of wind. It shows us where the wind blew where our ancestors were created.
Actually, now that I think of it, those words weren't so incongruous. In the villages and countryside in which I had been riding, I'd had the sense that everything there was happening in some sort of circle that seemed to begin in the wind. Everyone knew where their ancestors were created, if you will. A few days earlier, I talked to an olive grower. I told him that his trees were among the most beautiful things I had ever seen. While not prideful, he didn't seem surprised. "C'est aussi une cathedrale," he said. "Il est leve pour longtemps" : It has stood for a long time, like a cathedral. Later, he told me, "Quand cet arbre est plante, n'est pas pour son moi; n'est pas pour son enfants ou petit-enfants; il est pour leurs petit-enfants": You do not plant such a tree for yourself, for your children or grand-children; you plant it for their grandchildren.
At the tips of its leaves, one can also see a train of wind. It shows where the others have grown and where their fruits have been picked, by the ancestors of those who planted it: The grower told me that an olive tree has to grow a hundred years before it bears fruit. But, if cared for, it will continue to provide olives for a thousand years.
And it was given life by that same wind into which I would pedal a few days later.
Will we see Korean War II?
Technically, the North and South have been at war for the past sixty years. The fighting ended only with a truce in 1953, and there have been hostilities ever since, including North Korea's most recent attack.
And, of course, we can't forget that the US has stationed thousands of soldiers in Korea since World War II.
No matter what happens there, people go about their lives.
The woman is riding along the Yalu River, which forms North Korea's border with China. I stumbled upon this photo when I was looking up some articles about Korea.
No matter how great or powerful any country is, or becomes, it'always full of people like the woman in the photo. Whether the backdrop is as stunning as the one in the photo or as drab as an empty subdivision, we're really like that woman.
Last night, about two blocks from the end of my commute home, a van pulled up alongside me. The passenger side window rolled down. My heart was starting to pump: I was only two blocks from my apartment, but I was ready to pedal just about anywhere else. The light turned green and, just as I was ready to thrust my left pedal down, a man's voice rasped, "Hey, sexy. Why doesn't a beautiful lady like you use the bike lane?"
Now, that was one of the stranger things I've heard on my bike. But he's probably not the first to have asked the question, and I'm not the first cyclist to have heard it. But, if I were to meet that guy again (not that I'd want to!), I'd show him this:
It's one of those photos I wish I'd taken, but not because it would establish me as the next Eugene Atget. Rather, it shows all too clearly one of the reasons I normally don't use bike lanes.
Now, if it were only a matter of cars being parked, I could ride around them. But parked cars mean people getting in and out and, in some cases, not watching where they open doors. I learned a painful lesson in that about this time last year. At least I lived to laugh about it, once the pain subsided. Other cyclists, though, haven't been so fortunate.
The photo came from a website I just found: My Bike Lane, which is devoted entirely to bike lane violatons. In addition to photos, the license plate numbers of the most frequent offenders are posted.
Thanks to "Greg" for creating and maintaining the site.
