Ecojustice08’s Weblog

This is a report on my insane riding habits. For those who did not read my foundation article, let me recall the previous episodes: I have been riding a bike to and back from work for ten years now (and before that to and back from school). Up until 2006, I lived in the same city I was working, therefore I had a 15-mile daily ride. But then I moved to the countryside, with an 80 mile train ride in between. I kept riding my bicycle from the destination station to the office (7 miles and back), and in January 2007, I also decided to ride the stretch between my home and the train station, which is as steep as it can get (down and up a canyon). I started doing this in the middle of winter, riding in the dark and the cold at 6:30 in the morning, and coming back home the evening of the next day at 19:45 (again in the dark).

And I made it. It’s now been two winters now, and nobody will make me drive the van again (unless it is pouring down, or I oversleep, which has happened one in ten times on average). Let me list a few of the advantages of riding, even in the extreme conditions of winter:

• The duration of the ride is extremely predictable. With the van, I can get slowed or stuck by a fallen tree, a tractor, road works, fog.
• If I skid on snow or ice, I fall and that’s it. With the van, I could end up tumbling down to the river.
• The scenery is fabulous. Some mornings, when shreds of fog are lingering in the hollows while the sun is rising and the wind is whispering in my half frozen ears, are just plain ecstatic. Too bad I am not the sort of guy who can woohoo my enthusiasm.
• I have lost ten pounds and have managed to stay there. A bulging T-shirt after the age of thirty is not a fatality. Note that I still do not picture myself as athletic. I am just a fit commuter.
• People around me consider me as a sort of superman. It feels good, especially on the days I believe this myself. Unfortunately, a couple of neighbours have started to ride their bikes too. Now there are two more superpeople and I feel I have been demoted.
• Outside of downtown traffic, riding takes a lot less concentration than driving. No more unexplained gaps in the plot of the audio-books I am listening to.
• I can mend my vehicle myself. It does a hundred times the mpg of my van, with the added benefit of running on whatever I like to eat
• But the word that sums it up best is FREEDOM

And if you think you cannot commute by bike because it’s too slow and you do not have the time, think twice. I think the bicycle is the coolest invention of the twentieth century. That and semi-conductors.