Old Bike

There it sits, the Schwinn that was my ride for years, not spared the indignity of being seen with flat tires, cracked sidewalls, and rust. Since this photo was taken, when I was going to list it for a dollar on Craig's List, I have pumped up the tires (the tubes, amazingly, are intact) and scrubbed some of the rust from the frame and parts, and hatched a much more foolhardy plan: perhaps I can turn it into an Xtracycle. As I noted in a rambling comment on Carbon Trace, the frame is a very sturdy one and the fact that I could not carry an Xtracycle up the three flights of stairs (see apartment building visible in the bike photo for the kind of stairs we're talking about) is no deterrent to this strange dream of keeping my longtime bike with me. Refurbishing, even without the Xtracycle free radical attachment, would be costly, which is why I bought a new bike instead in the first place. I don't need two bikes; I've got a rack and panniers on the new one, but still, the idea is taking on a life of its own. I keep the old tires full now, waiting.
That bike and I, we went places together.

Post Scriptum: Listening to a bit of Elvis Costello, as what could be more appropriate after McCain got his American History wrong ? So, here are the lyrics, by J.B. Lenoir, that Costello croons and rocks in the sadly apt "Eisenhower Blues." Music here.


Hey everybody, I was talkin' to you
I ain't tellin' you jivin', this is the natural truth
Mm mm mm, I got them Eisenhower blues
Thinkin' about me and you, what on earth are we gonna do?

My money's gone, my fun is gone
The way things look, how can I be here long?
Mm mm mm, I got them Eisenhower blues
Thinkin' about me and you, what on earth are we gonna do?

Taken all my money, to pay the tax
I'm only givin' you people, the natural facts
I only tellin' you people, my belief
Because I am headed straight, on relief
Mm mm mm, I got them Eisenhower blues
Thinkin' about me and you, what on earth are we gonna do?

Ain't go a dime, ain't even got a cent
I don't even have no money, to pay my rent
My baby needs some clothes, she needs some shoes
Peoples I don't know what, I'm gonna do
Mm mm mm, I got them Eisenhower blues
Thinkin' about me and you, what on earth are we gonna do?

I'm Back

Whew. That was close. I almost became a regular blogger back there in August. I've been so busy, happily so, adjusting to the new job and trying to get into a rhythm of biking to work. I seem to have had the opposite problem of John at Cycling in Wichita, who was having trouble with cooler temperatures; the heat was getting to me. No reason to sweat, the slow bike movement claims, unless, you know, your ride involves going uphill on the home commute and it's a humid 80+. So I waited. We also had some fierce weather, as in lightning almost every afternoon, but the idea of biking in remained a siren song. Now, I've had some beautiful mornings, and I'm fairly addicted to mornings in the high 60's-low 70's, the ride up past beautiful farmhouses and green lawns (I settled on a longer route than the one I filmed, to avoid the car-whizzing road on the most direct route). I'm out at about 6:45, and here is the thing I enjoy most amid the dewy fog rising off of the green all around me, the dark lifting to orange, and it's a funny and poignant sight all at once: high-schoolers waiting for their buses. I turn the bike out onto the street, and halfway up the block are a gaggle of children in uniform, mostly African-American, who by now are getting used to me, but for whom I provided quite a spectacle at first glance. Adults, of course, are so ridiculous. Giggles, "where she goin' ?"; "hey, it's bike lady." Up and over the hill, where the road opens to farms and houses set back behind trees, it's mostly white kids, two or lone standing at street signs, already dressed to perfection in the costume of their tribe. My favorite is two punk girls: the tunics, the tights, the leather boots, gelled hair, black eyeliner, lacquered lips and nails, who never fail to stare in open-mouthed wonder and disdain as I ride past. They look so awkward and assured all at once. I suppose the adjective is incongruous: me, with the cool of the air on my skin and the scent of morning making its way past my cappuccino fueled self, while they scan for the bus, anxious as if something might mar them before the yellow doors swing open and sweep them off to their world, backpacks and cellphones, lockers and rules, that beautiful and ruthless self-consciousness of teenagers, two of whom lean against the street post, snicker, and silently telegraph what the hell are you looking at ? But I see their eyes slide as the bike glides by, how freely it escapes the yellow behemoth coming up from behind as they await the hiss and the hot air of the unfolded doors and I ride on.

The Pink Bike Lady

Many thoughts, no time. But did read a marvelous story, found via EcoVelo, of the pink bike lady. According to the comments section, not only has this woman travelled the world via her (heavy) bike, but she is a daily commuter as well. I just liked the story and the way the writer thinks she is a nut and then realizes that she is "serious." Still pondering that, and gender showing here, admit that I think of "serious" as a guy word, when used to indicate an intense and/or highly competent level of doing something.

Also found The Practical Pedal, a free print/online bike commuter magazine out of Bozman, MT. It doesn't look as if they put out a summer issue this year, but the blog is updated. Good stuff and a sense of humor. Alas, I've never been to Bozman, but had the pleasure of spending about six weeks living in Missoula one summer. I went all around that town on a bike found in a friend's garage. Good memories, there. Great town. There was a wonderful bookstore (I still have a bookmark from it) called Freddy's Feed and Read, gone now. Memo to self: find and scan in bookmark. I know where it is: in a copy of Janet Kauffman's Places in the World a Woman Can Walk, which I bought there. Now, where is the book ? It really is amazing that I can remember the places where I've purchased books: the town, the stores, the light, what the shelving looked like. Needless to say, BNB (Barnes & Noble, Borders) purchases all run together in the way airports do during a long trip. Rambling here, going to bed.

I need some serious sleep. And I'm serious about sleeping.
PS. For those of you who cannot stand the anticipation, I bought the silver teapot. It has arrived. Photo soon.

You Go, Girl

I was going to write a short sentence excusing myself from blogging these past few days due to sunshine, sushi, and Campari over ice. I came across this: "Armed 85 Year Old Woman Makes Intruder Call Cops". I grew up in a house where four rifles hung on a gun rack above the piano, where I learned to target shoot by the time I was five (a skill long gone, though the cute photo of me in my fluffy pink winter jacket holding the gun endures), yet I do not own a gun, think that too many people have too many guns and that said guns aren't meant for hunting, and yet... my first thought was approval and admiration. I don't know if I admire more the fact that she held the burglar at bay or that she had the guts to own a gun in the first place. They say you should never carry anything for protection that can be turned against you, but then, you can be strangled with a shoelace. Well done, Leda Smith. You go girl. Remember to reload.

Same to this woman, 93, who actually fired at ---but missed--- a burglar in her house. In their infinite wisdom, the CA police will not charge the woman. Well...yeah.

Biking and What Matters

The post on AWBs (Academics Who Bike) has brought some new readers (hello there !) and some delightful conversation. I also must stop watching the Olympics and go to bed before two. So, I was visiting Post Secret while waiting through a boring stretch of volley ball, and came across this postcard, which I've appropriated (after properly referencing, you should kindly note).

My derrière is fine (I've been told), but a sentiment and a benefit not to be overlooked. And a new clue for how to spot an AWB on campus.

Stolen Manifesto

Found at Wheel Revolution. Evoked forgotten time when this was posted on my refrigerator. (Blogs are the new fridge doors ? In some cases, dear reader.) Some specifics are for men. Who cares ? Goes with the current career change/biking/meaning of life themes on my mind now. I love "Be joyful though you have considered all the facts."

The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

By Wendell Berry

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won't compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion -- put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

Academics Who Bike

AWB's, we'll call them, because BA's or AB's (Biking Academics/ Academics Biking) takes away their Ph.D.'s. I wonder if this is a new phenomenon, or if academic types who already have blogs (and bikes) will be starting up new, subsidiary blogs to accommodate their interest in bike culture and bike commuting. (I should add that I mean "subsidiary" in the business sense, not in the sense of "less important.") On the few biking blogs that I read, Bike Commuters and Bike Portland, a large number of the bike commuters, as was humorously remarked on Bike Commuters, seem to be IT people, not a few of whom work at universities. So it is good to see some from the academic side with biking blogs: John, of Blog Meridian, who has been known to drop by these pages, now writes of Cycling in Wichita, and a Springfieldian (MO), has just launched Carbon Trace. You can see I have a really large sample here, but that is not going to stop me from announcing a new phenomenon (academics do not call it a "trend" unless they are statisticians), the blogs of academics who bike. Based upon my sample (cough), AWBs appear to have a strong desire to compartmentalize, hence a separate blog for this facet of their existence, yet express an equally or more powerful will to integrate the actual biking (but not the blog) into various facets of their lives, e.g. it's not '"about the bike;" it's about bike culture and environmental and social concerns, and about not getting squished. Well, okay, sometimes it is about the bike, but not in that spandexy sense. I can actually see the rationale behind the separate blogs, as this is something that has already been happening: each blog attracts its own community, so establishing a new blog allows one to make contact with and link up with those who have those same interests, or as Andrew Cline of Carbon Trace put it, he did not want to go "off topic" in his other blog, which is about his academic subject. Since my blog has no topic and my career is a secret, I have not branched off. So I have started a new section in the sidebar: academic bike blogs (ABBs ? No.). I expect that at least one of the subjects of this post will have suggestions as to how to enlarge the list. And then we shall study these creatures in their natural habitat.