My dear friend Bike Nerd was not always a bike obsessed fiend. When I met him, he had a borrowed bike and couldn’t change a tire. I was the one with the crazy odometer count and the mad roadside skillz. Bike Nerd called me Bike Girl! as though I was some kind of superhero in spandex with tire irons on my belt and heartbreaking calves. Today he has thousands of road miles on his treads on more than one continent while I can’t make it up the steep end of the street to my house.
I’ve lost my cred. I parked the bikes in the storage locker where they got musty and gummy from disuse. I took the bus, carpooled, but didn’t ride much. Everything was too close or too far. The supermarket was a block away, my employer 30 miles away by bike trail. The movies, a twenty minute walk downhill, meaning uphill the whole way back, my best pal, a twenty minute drive. The bike just didn’t seem practical – it was either an epic day trip or not worth the bother of hauling it out of the basement for a five minute spin. I’ve always ridden because it made sense as transportation and living where I was, the bike rarely made sense.
All that’s changed with my move to the Western edge. It’s a fifteen minute ride to my best pal, the supermarket, the library, the farmer’s market… another ten minutes and I’m at the beach. It’s an hour to the place I’m working right now, or half an hour on the bike and another fifteen minutes with my bike on the bus rack. It’s summer and the streets of my neighborhood are wide and dry with great visibility, and in many cases, views.
Gradually, I’m increasing my range. The first days back on the bike I’d ride to the Junction or visiting, maybe two miles. Thus reminded that I hadn’t forgotten how – there’s a reason they say it’s like riding a bicycle – I started riding down to the beach – about four miles, one way. I also started taking the bike/bus combo to downtown, riding to the stop underneath the bridge where a person can catch more than one bus and then, riding all the way out of downtown to the last stop before the buses get on the West Seattle Bridge.
Last week I added the lower bridge to my ride and was rewarded with views of the industrial mess and wonder that’s the Duwamish Slough. Dozens of yellow backhoes are lined up with military precision next to a rusting drawbridge that’s forever up. The slough is green and full of barges. If you look to the south, there’s a Lego stack of shipping containers and behind them, Mount Rainier. This morning, a single file line of geese swam the waters in front of a luxury cruiser boat and this afternoon, a bunch of guys hosed off the decks of a barge moored at the fishing dock. I have to share the road with a lot of heavy traffic – Harbor Island is a major shipping center and big trucks come in and out all day – but I’ve yet to encounter a truck driver who won’t give right of way to a girl on a bicycle if only she’ll take the time to make eye contact so he knows she’s there.
Riding with cars is maddening; I’ve not forgotten that, so I’m a defensive rider of the highest order. I make sure I’m seen, I use hand signals, I have an orange safety vest I can wear if I’m not wearing bright colors, and I observe the traffic laws. It’s potentially fatal to jump lights and make sudden moves. There is no way a girl on a bike can win against several tons of steel – it’s best to make sure she’s seen and doesn’t do anything unpredictable. I will take the sidewalk if it makes sense, but I will also ride well out in the lane if that’s the safest place for me to be. I always let cars pass as soon as I can and hey, I get to be there, it’s the rules of the road. I wear gloves because I’ve landed on my hands before and the gloves saved me a lot of additional gravel in the palms. And I always wear a helmet because I need my brain for thinking and, you know, writing stuff down.
With my weak legs and weak lungs, I’m taking it slow as I get back on the road. I add a little distance and a little climbing every day. I’m gradually tuning up little bits on the bike, unpacking the gear I have and using it, getting faster and riding easier. I’m hoping to drop the saddlebags my non-bike life gave me and I’m hoping to be able to master the long climb from Spokane Street up to High Point. I’d like to find that my retired superhero still has some life left in her. Mostly, by the time summer ends, I want to be able to say this: “Yo, BIke Nerd! On your left!”
Bike Girl sez: I’ve never seen worse service in a bike shop then at Alki Bike and Boards at the Admiral Junction. The place is full of twenty somethings hanging out on their summer vacations – which is fine – but they won’t stop talking about how much they hate the music on PA long enough to help you find what you’re looking for. When you finally get help, they don’t seem to know the inventory or care. Boo. The folks at Aaron’s can be a little brusque, but they won’t ignore you and they know their stuff.
[tags]biking, cycling, West Seattle, bicycle commuting[/tags]
Bring it on, Pam. Bring it on.
May those lungs and legs rediscover the strength of old times quickly. Glad to hear about the helmet. Have worked twice briefly on neurology wards, helmets are important.
You go, Bike Girl! Are you updating your superhero costume?
From Seth, who got a posting error and sent this in via email:
Regarding that “rusting drawbridge”, i took some pictures and had a brief conversation with the bridge tender which might shed some light on why it is “forever up”. It’s all on my blog here.
Cool pics, thanks, Seth. And @ RC, I’m ONLY getting a new costume if it’s made by the designer from The Incredibles.
Have you tried the bike/water taxi commute yet? It is a sweet way to commute, you can use your bus pass, and you get a 10-minute harbor tour.