Life Cycling

I ride my bike every day that I can - that is, every day it is not icy out or dumping rain - and as long as my feet and legs and hips and back and shoulders are willing.  I do it cause I would rather pedal around than fire up a gasoline engine and navigate roads in a strictly by the book fashion.  Because I very much dislike waiting in line (say, at traffic signals), particularly whilst pouring fossil fuel emissions into the air, the land, and indirectly, the water.

So - yeah, I am not a fitness nut (clearly).  I am actually lazy - and to me, it is easier, more free-flowing, to toodle around on wheels than to walk (fer heaven's sake), or to (see above)

So, about that part where I said I dislike going strictly by the book, waiting in line....  Ok, I admit, on my bike, I cut a few corners - literally.  I try not to do anything blatantly illegal or dangerous, but I do exercise (see, I knew exercise was gonna find its way into this discussion) some poetic license.  Also, I am 57 years old and not quite as sharp as I once was.  Add the fact that I spent most of my life quite near sighted and refusing to wear glasses, and so, developed a habit of not seeing some stuff the way others do.  Yeah, I wear them now, but a lifetime habit shadows my perceptions (so if you pass me on the street and I do not say hi, just know that I may not have 'seen' you).

Miraculously, despite my intentional transgressions and unintentional blunders, most people are friendly to me out in the world of mostly cars and trucks and a few bicycles and even fewer pedestrians where I "cruise".  Some, in fact, are overly considerate and slow down for me, inviting me to "go" when it is not my turn at an intersection (despite the 13 cars behind and around them whose drivers do not share the same sentiments - no, I do not "go").  These people piss off everyone but I am pretty sure cyclists in general and I in particular are the recipients of that anger.   I could digress here into a discussion of how my timing is often thrown off by fossil fueled well wishers but hey, it's a give and take - I forgive their misplaced kindness and many forgive my blunders and mildly aggressive maneuverings.

The other day, this was not the case.  Kevin and I rode bikes to the mail drop box, hoping to catch the mailman because it was too late to make it to the post office with my ebay packages.  Kevin cut the corner through an empty  parking lot at the signal, trailer full of packages and all but I chose not to because the cliff of a drop at the driveway is too fierce to navigate for me if I don't have to.  Anyway, I could see the signal would work for me so I took the "highway".  At the signal, which was green, I turned right (onto a one way street) and then changed lanes into the left lane (with no traffic coming from any side) and then went up onto the sidewalk (because it is legal on that block and the signal was gonna change and the traffic is fierce at rush hour) and rode a block on the sidewalk to where Kevin was waiting at the mailbox.  As I almost reached Kevin, a man on a dirt bike rode up, stopped in the road, with traffic blasting by, and proceeded to yell at me:  "That's the way, just go on, never thinking about those of us out here who are DRIVING these roads.  You are such a fucking DUMB ASS".  Then he revved up his bike and blasted off.

The weird thing is, I have no idea how I could have offended him.  I turned with the signal, no oncoming traffic, no one behind me.  I got off the road almost immediately, not that I was required to, and I had time to casually ride my bike an entire block before he caught up to me.  Whatever I did, I was totally unaware of and Kevin could also not figure out my "crime".

I imagine the biker did not realize I was with Kevin because a lot of times a man who would go off on me alone would not dream of it when I am with another man.  Yeah, this is the world I live in - most men are kind and gracious but not all and yes, sexism is real.

The mad irony floored me even as I was being blasted.  Here was a guy on a dirt bike - proclaiming that he was a member of that elite group "us people who are DRIVING these roads" - after all, is that not the complaint so many drivers of encapsulated vehicles have about dirt bikers?  And did this guy not stop in the lane of a busy main thoroughfare to rant at me, thus creating a traffic hazard?

Yeah, that hurt my feelings.  It turns out we had missed the mailman but I would not ride to the post office to try and catch a late arriving mailman and ask him to take our loot.  I was too shaken up to ride through rush hour traffic.  I actually broke down crying.  And the next day - when I had to go alone to mail my stuff, I was afraid that guy would come along.... and the next....