ride with me.

4 wheels good 2 wheels better

Michigan Avenue, mid-morning
Chicago, IL

and then suddenly

a found poem

we are wet
the woods thicken
it's getting darker

little muddy paths
lead off to the left
into the woods
until you can't see
them anymore

where to?
we climb.

this is never going to end.

and then suddenly
like a bolt of lightening
nothing happens

but then truly
absolutely nothing

everything

goes on doing
what
it's always done



Found in Tim Krabbe's The Rider

racked

Walker Art Museum
Minneapolis, MN

new take on an old theme

Bikes In Strange Places
Originally uploaded by Lady Vervaine.

Kind of thing that makes me wish I was there when it happened.

From the inimitable Lady Vervaine during her travels in Iceland.

the peach

Soft...
Originally uploaded by +fatman+.

a found poem

Most people experience
a truly great piece of fruit
very rarely

that perfect peach
you ate one summer day
long ago

a taste you hope for
in every subsequent peach
but never quite recapture

Found in Jillian's PaperForager, in a piece attributed to a New Yorker profile of the Fruit Detective by John Seabrook

This happened to me twice.

The first time was early autumn in Boulder, Colorado. It was late, around 9, and a chill misty rain was falling. I ran into my housemate on campus and together we mounted our bikes for the ride home.

(There was a three year period in my life when I rode in a few buses and airplanes, but managed to avoid cars entirely. During that time I only rode my bike or walked. This was then. When finally I did step into a car it felt like the sky was falling, the roof over my head was so startling and strange.)

As we were unlocking our bikes Tim said: "I know a great peach tree on the way home," and he led the way.

The peach tree was personal property, and I was a bit of a prude. I didn't want to climb the fence and steal the peach. I was reading St Augustine's City of God for a class assignment, and could think of nothing but that pear tree and the stolen fruit.

Besides: I was pretty sure I didn't like peaches, because the fuzz made me gag. Tim thought I was being ridiculous, left his bike in my hands and scurried over the wall.

A sidenote: Tim was a kung fu master -- it was he who introduced me to Jackie Chang, early Jackie Chang, god bless him for all eternity -- and watching him scramble over a fence taller than his head was a particular treat. I didn't mind being left behind.

He returned shortly with two peaches, which he pulled out from under his shirt where he had tucked them in for the return trip. I can only speak for mine because he devoured his. It was same temperature as the air around us, which meant that it was perfectly chilled. It was washed with the gentle mist that was washing my cheeks, and it was ideally just-enough-juice-running-down-your-chin ripe.

I had never tasted anything so wonderful. I suspect it was the combination that did it -- the perfect fruit and the trespass -- because even though I didn't scale the wall, I felt guilty for eating the contraband. I wasn't inclined to break rules, still am not, but the illicit thrill of it was undeniable.

I would taste something just as sweet, underscored by that illicit thrill, later, when the stakes were higher, when scaling the wall couldn't be undone and would shatter and shake many of the other walls that were erected in my life.

And when I did I remembered that peach.

But that's another story for another time.

object of desire

Some girls get that jumpy feeling in their chest when they spot a great handbag or a fine skein of wool just begging to be knit.

I. love. bikes.

They don't have to be fancy or all tricked out. They do have to be rugged. Mountain-like. Ready for rough roads -- none of those skinny treadless tires for me, please.

I get that slow burn feeling of desire when I spot one of these -- well-loved, well-used. Take me to bed, baby -- this is all I need.

My life works better when there's a bike ride waiting for me somewhere in the periphery. Solitary more often than not: I don't like to chat. I like to ride. For most of my life riding was synonymous with altitude: the canyons around Boulder were great for those steep stand-up-and-walk-those-pedals grades. Seattle too.

Chicagoland not so much.

This place is about wide open prairies and far horizons and days when you ride for hours without tiring a bit. Except for your rump which wears sore much more quickly when you're not standing up for those grades.

It's 2 below this morning -- it's been hovering in the subzeros for some time -- there are no long rides in my imminent future. Not until Spring.

So for now I row on an erg that I picked up when I moved to the flatlands, already hungry for that other object of desire in my new land-locked home -- the shell lifted high and then lowered into the drink, the sympathy of oars sculling across the water in synch.

But soon there will Spring. And road. And miles to go before I sleep.


This lovely creature lives in Antigua, Guatemala. Just as this was shot she was perched in an old ruined convent.

two wheels good

Unlike the horse-drawn carriage, the bicycle was almost silent. It did not crush people to death, nor did it foul the streets with excrement. There were exaggerated complaints about irresponsible velocipedists, but there was also official support for the ‘feedless horse’. Special roads for cyclists were built in France and the United States.

Herlihy mentions the bike path that ran from Prospect Park to Coney Island (‘about 10,000 cyclists participated in the inaugural parade’ in 1885), but not the more spectacular aerial cycle path, opened in 1900, that ran at roof-height for more than nine miles between Los Angeles and Pasadena. Cyclists could ride four abreast on a surface of oregon hardwood, lit by arc lamps every 200 feet. At the halfway point, a bicycle elevator joined the track to the a café, a restaurant and a cascino. Mechanics with pumps and spare parts were positioned all along the track.

From Graham Robb's review of David Herlihy's «Bicycle: The History» in the London Review of Books

Herlihy wasn't the only one who missed that one -- I lived in South Pas and worked in Pasadena for awhile and never heard a word or spotted a remnant of the path Robb writes about. Reminds me of when they outlawed bicycles in Beijing. Where have all the bicycles gone? They were asked to leave.

have a seat

When I spotted this Schwinn on the University of Chicago campus, I thought I had spotted a rare treasure. Walking around the neighborhood later I realized it was the bike of choice for grad students who had stayed through the summer session. Battered old Schwinn's were a dime a dozen.

But that didn't make them any less lovely.

Hyde Park, Chicago IL

Here's the whole (brief) Schwinn set »

we ride tonight!

(Or at least those of us with courage do -- I'm just wanting to snag me a cool retro-poster...)

Check out the World Naked Bike Ride site for the helpful FAQ, including answers to: "Won't my bike seat hurt my crotch if I'm naked?" and "What is the law on being naked in public?"