Alissa Bell has a fine piece about becoming a cyclist at The Cycling Independent.
She’s actually been one for quite a spell, and logged plenty of the hard miles, not just in the Benighted States of America but in places some hardcore cyclists will never straddle a top tube, like Vietnam, Egypt, and Sudan.
But Bell says she really started feeling like a cyclist when she began “riding less, but more intentionally.” She continues:
Riding my bike is the closest I’ll ever get to pausing time. As long as I’m in the saddle (or hiking beside if need be) there is time to think, to feel, to let the knots in my mind relax enough that there is hope of untangling them later. Whether for two hours or two months, cycling gives me a break from the relentless pace of a life that’s always been a little too fast for me.
How does one stop The Machine? By starting another one. Go read the whole piece. It’s liberating.
Mad Blog Media 
The city just finished a significant bike path extension, spitting distance from my front porch. They tunneled under a major four-lane road, and now they just need to add a bridge over the railroad tracks (should be done this fall) and then even my geriatric ass can ride nonstop and without traffic all the way to Old Town. Heading in the other direction, they’re adding a bike lane to the I 25 overpass, so we can safely connect to the Poudre Trail which leads all the way to Greeley. Good times to be a two-wheeler.
That is indeed a fine read. Made my day.
Seems the TCI crew has found some skilled fresh perspectives. I hope we see more stuff from Alissa Bell and Laura Killingbeck.
Yup. Good thoughts about how we often over-do things when a short and simple ride to the post office or grog shop will suffice. This past year I got a heavy duty tanker 3 speed with nice, cushy fat tires on it. It’s slow, ugly and godawful heavy, not unlike it’s owner. This bike will never see clipless pedals, a computer, a guy wearing a team jersey aboard or any other suggestion of workout/fitness ethos. I enjoy the hell out of running errands on it and not giving two shits if it’s muddy out, or if the bike falls over in the crappy bike stands outside many stores. If I did come across a really big hill I’d likely have to walk up it but as she points out….that just gives you more time to think things over. Or really in my case, let the mind totally drift wherever it wants.
That’s kinda what my Voodoo Wazoo is for. Seven-speed 13-34 cassette, single 38T chainring, mismatched cantis, flat bar, thumbshifter, 42mm Conti knobbies. My sport utility bike.
Wowser! Alyssa rings the Bell!
Superb perspective from a woman who’s far exceeded my bike-riding experiences in places that make my bike-riding efforts seem infantile!
And ….. a very, very talented writer to boot!
Thanks, PO’G ,for the connection to a terrific writer/bike-rider and to Old Herb for the reminder that Rule #1 is FUN!! No matter how long/short the ride!
Nailed it, didn’t she? The humble bicycle is also a magic carpet.
That was a good piece. TCI seems to be broadening its horizons a bit. I hope they pick up some of the refugees from the Great Magazine Fiasco at Adventure Cycling.
55 mph, eh, Patrick? What road is that? I guess speed that means if someone drifts onto the shoulder, you will be in heaven long before the devil knows you’re dead!
That’s Old 66 just east of Tramway. Takes you up and over I-40 toward Tijeras, Cedar Crest, etc. It’s a nice wide shoulder, got some up and down to it, leads to even more up and down depending upon which way you go. Head south on 337 and you keep the wide shoulders and go up up up. The Morning Star Grocery makes a nice turnaround. Makes for 42 miles and 2,421 feet of vertical gain from El Rancho Pendejo.
Nice. That little Morning Star Grocery reminds me a little of the Hygienic Store in Kahaluu. One of those little places that time forgot.
From Waialae, where I was renting a place near the U of H with some grad students (was my first job and I was buried in Honolulu cost of living and those school loans that Sleepy Joe wasn’t paying off yet), it was about a 45 mile round trip on that 1985 Cannondale Boneshaker around the east end of Oahu, up the Windward side, and with the turnaround at the Hygienic Store, which was no longer a dairy but an open fruit and veggie market. It had the best apple bananas on the island. I would buy a few, eat one, stuff my jersey pockets with a few more, and head back to the homestead.
https://www.honolulumagazine.com/the-hygienic-store/
Ahh, the days….
Khal, guess where I’ll be in about 3 weeks.
https://hawaii.usmc-mccs.org/lodging/beach-cottages
Ooo la la … the life, it is a beach, no?
And I have to thank all of you, the American taxpayers, for subsidizing this gem. Wish I could take all of you with me.
I think those are the same cottages we used to go to back in the 1960s on Oahu.
We went to Sioux City in the Sixties. Not at all the same class of experience. Though Grandpa John had an excellent vegetable patch and Grandma Maude baked a hell of a cookie.
I’ll bet they are at least that old. Reserving a cabin only got automated this past year. Classic government GS-9 situation where they hired someone 30 years ago to do this job, and they can’t streamline that job until he or she retires. So booking a cabin meant catching Shirley at her desk, and then she looked at her desk blotter where she marked down reservations with a straight edge and a #2 Ticonderoga.
So many rules. Active duty assigned to Hawaii could book them a year out, everyone else could only go 60 days out. No checking in or out on Sat/Sun/Mon. 7 day max.
It’s like every other good deal for the military. We’ll create this awesome program, but then make it nearly impossible for anyone to sign up for it, because we know it won’t scale. And they design it for families, but it never crossed their mind that Pvt Tentpeg and Specialist Schmeddlapp might want to get out of the barracks for a 3 day weekend.
They kinda sorta joined the 21st century this past year. The reservation page looks like a DOS 2.0 product, but at least you can see availability windows, instead of calling Shirley and hearing her say, nope, nothing 60 days out, try again tomorrow.
Nice! I had a USMC bicycling friend who used to get us on the Kaneohe base as guests for bicycle rides. Lovely place!
Apple bananas? Gots to get me some! They sound like they might taste like real fruit instead of what now passes for bananas which are flavorless. I thought it was just my ageing taste buds but there are many people who think so. These new “hybrids” are only suitable for the tailpipe trick in Beverly Hills Cop.
I can deal with the modern banana only as a component of smoothies. Happily, the berries have been pretty good lately — strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, etc.
I only got to the “ I can deal with the modern banana …” part and just assumed you were playing Mad Libs.
(Also what most of us will be if we don’t get this election thing figured out)
We’re all of us likely to get the Classic Banana if we don’t get this election thing figured out.
Herself testing again.
Pat O’Brien testing again.
Second time’s a charm! Looks like us Safari users are back in the club.
Yes! Safari is singing again so let the snark & bark fly!