The View From My Bikeseat

Getting out for walks, runs, bikerides, and whatnot are a really pleasant sign of the season. What was only months before a near barren stretch of cement, dashed with worn out yellow marks, has become a shared space for the alternative commuter, the family moment, the pleasantly solitary stroll. When I would bike to school not so many years ago, I would generally wear headphones on the ride. Most of the time, I left before 6:30 in the morning, so listening to a few familiar tunes wasn't an altogether foolish life choice. Now, though, I hardly use headphones at all and especially not on a bike.

I have heard mention of laws against wearing headphones in the car, which makes sense. Headphones--especially earbuds--insulate you from outside. In cars, this acts as a sort of double insulation, but on a bike, it can be all the more serious. If you screw up on a bike, you don't have too much time to react; it is kind of like this: biking to accident to cement. I have hit the grass plenty of times and just the other day I managed to sort of walk over my handlebars as my wheel caught in the sidewalk to avoid falling on my face. These events, though, are more like "missing the ground" than quick thinking on my part. They pale in comparison to when I bashed into a low red brick fence or went bodily over my handlebars when I hit a ball on the ground or hit the front step and tore the skin from the back of my right pinky finger. The former are accidents within accidents by comparison.

Over the years of bicycling to school or work or just around, I have learned that most Lincolnite motorists--saying little of motorists in general--have no idea you are there when you are biking. This is in part the result of parents stressing safety to kids, I think, and thus putting most of us on the sidewalk once we can steer well enough. Cyclists aren't seen as fixtures of the road. Sometimes I see stretchy-pants clad cyclists going all out on the main thoroughfares on my side of town, and I quietly applaud. But the cars go over forty miles and hour and I don't feel like tempting fate that much. Downtown and in the neighborhoods, I am on the street with lights and reflectors at the ready.

All the same, cyclists have to stay on their toes so to speak, because more than once I have stopped just as some bonehead pulls into the crosswalk where I might have been had I not seen the lights reflected in a window or blinking between tree trunks. It is odd, really, to worry most about two extraordinarily disparate groups of motorists: young men and old women. Really, though, the first is going to fast most of the time and the latter has a harder time taking in all the information on the road. Either way though, if I get hit by a car, I will assume it is one of these two. (My closest calls have been old women in large, heavy, likely ill-maintained behemoths of steel; they turn without looking at the crosswalk and have missed me by inches when I barely pass or stop just short.)

With more and more hours logged on the bike trails, though, I have come to fear a greater insularity with the world by most people. Maybe it is always like this and I just notice it more, or maybe my bike and I are quieter than I suppose, but I earnestly try to avoid spooking people when I pass or cross. Groups of young people are the worst in this regard; I can shout ahead that I am coming and more often than not, they are entirely unmoved. My bike is a street bike and I often fear hitting a patch of gravel or sand or mud if I have to hop off the trail to get around them. If I do, nothing frightens people more and I expect someone to jump or gesture right into me. This hasn't happened yet, but I fear it sooner or later will.

These groups as well as runners often wear headphones and--the most irksome--earbuds. The slow, rhythmic strides suggest some calm, some unexpecting disposition that my intrusion will shatter. Runners are the least worrisome, to be honest, and often I think none at all about passing them by. I call out to them, warning them if they have any ear to the trail at all, and whiz passed. In pairs or groups though, between the meditation of a good run and the ambiance of your own soundtrack, the anxiety grows. Their minds can be thousands of miles away and without all but the most intense heckling, I am without a clue.

The other concern are pairs or troops of adults, often with strollers or dogs or children on bikes and trikes. These worry me less, but etiquette is one of those things I think one ought to start with early but is often forgotten altogether. Again, hopping off the trail is that safest, surest route to avoid an incident, because whenever I stick to the trail, I expect someone to veer out in front of me and I can see me pull a one-hundred-eighty degree vertical flip in the air before crashing to the ground, behind me, some crumpled child whimpering numbly.

I dramatize somewhat, but the view from my bikeseat is not exactly pretty. I plan and assume and strategize for oddball circumstances, for curve balls, and stray children. In some ways my favorite ride is the late night bounding up steep hills, able to see anything that might lay ahead. Of course, it is in those nights that I make up my own worries. Creatures from horror stories slink in the shadows or chase me from tree branches. (I often recall cut scenes from video game Dark Corners of the Earth, in which an unseen, heavily breathing creature, surveys the town from rooftops while you inspect the streets below.) In the end, such anxieties make the ride itself more successful, they make the ride a triumph rather than a commute. So, I take those well, excited to get home for rest, water, and a shower.