What a magnificent ride this morning. Thanks to North Carolina’s loose interpretation of “winter,” I needed only a tank top, lightweight shirt, and leggings to keep me plenty warm today. The air was fresh and wet, and soft puffy clouds shielded my eyes from the full exuberance of the sunrise. When I stopped to take off my sweater, I saw cardinals hopping and chirping in the tree next to me, and a red-headed woodpecker insistently drilling a telephone pole. I had to laugh. I could’ve ridden for hours.
It isn’t always this perfect, though. Last week I hit a real morale slump. I was tired, and it was cold. On Tuesday, riding my bike seemed like about as much fun as cleaning out a porta-john. But somehow I made myself do it. Wednesday, I was prevented by a 70% chance of rain. Thursday, a freak snowstorm kept me off the road. (Like I said, Carolina winters…)
Yesterday I finally hooked up a bike odometer I got for Christmas, and gathered some encouraging statistics. This morning I spent just under 28 minutes in motion, at an average speed of 11.7 mph. I maxed out at 17.7 mph on Benbow Street, and covered 5.5 miles overall. And, may I encourage you, I did all this on a 12-year-old mountain bike with 24" diameter tires - which is to say, if your bike is anything other than prehistoric, you will probably go even faster.
Incidentally, in the process I burned 149 calories and 15.9 grams of fat, rather than 1/3 gallon of gasoline. I saved myself a dollar and twenty minutes at the gym. And all that will double this afternoon.
In my slump last week, I set myself a goal: to commute by bike 100 times this spring. So far, I’ve done 27. If I make this goal, I’ll cover the distance from here to New York City. (So far, I’d be in Warfield, VA.) I’ll save at least 30 gallons of gas, and $100 in fuel costs. (At this point I’ve saved almost one tank.) And best of all, I’ll spend two entire days of time outside, time that I would otherwise spend stuck behind the wheel.
I’m excited.
by Sadie Kneidel
Showing posts with label commuting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label commuting. Show all posts
Monday, February 18, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
This American Bike Commute, Part III
“Forecast: 30% chance of rain. Cloudy developing into rain showers by afternoon.”
I regarded the forecast with a sigh. After great deliberation, I decided to ride the bus to work this morning. In addition to the possibility of getting soaked, I won’t lie – I’m kinda sore from all this biking. Good sore, the way you feel after a satisfying workout. But sore enough that sitting still seemed like a nice idea.
And it was nice, to sit placidly and read a book as we jostled down the sleepy morning streets. It was nice to see some of my English students on the bus, to say “Salaam aleikum” and sit down next to a scarved Muslim woman named Maha.
But at the same time, it was hard to concentrate on my book. I’d brought my bike along, because sometimes my class ends too late to catch the afternoon bus. It was secured to the bike rack on the front of the bus – supposedly - but I kept peering out the windshield at the barely-visible handlebars like an anxious mother. My brain played a running video of the bike jiggling loose, falling, getting crushed by the mighty bus. It would be as bad as running over my dog, I felt. That bike and I have been together for more than a decade.
And once I got to school, it just didn’t feel right. When I wheeled my bike over to the bike rack, the usual crew looked confused. “You’re dressed awful light this morning,” said one.
“Yeah… I rode the bus this morning,” I said abashedly. Why did I feel so sheepish? Riding the bus is still a great solution. Heck, it wasn’t like I’d driven a car or something.
I continued into my building. Still, nothing felt right. I wasn’t hot and sweaty. My cheeks weren’t glowing with energy. I didn’t need to go triumphantly change my clothes in the handicap stall in the bathroom. Out of habit, I filled up my water bottle at the water fountain and chugged half of it – but it wasn’t as satisfying as usual. So I just stood boredly in the hallway and waited for them to unlock my classroom. I’d gotten used to feeling alive, surging with energy and adrenaline, at this hour of the morning. This just didn’t cut it.
So far the sky is streaked with blue and gray, some patches almost sunny. I’m holding my breath and hoping I get to ride home.
by Sadie Kneidel
I regarded the forecast with a sigh. After great deliberation, I decided to ride the bus to work this morning. In addition to the possibility of getting soaked, I won’t lie – I’m kinda sore from all this biking. Good sore, the way you feel after a satisfying workout. But sore enough that sitting still seemed like a nice idea.
And it was nice, to sit placidly and read a book as we jostled down the sleepy morning streets. It was nice to see some of my English students on the bus, to say “Salaam aleikum” and sit down next to a scarved Muslim woman named Maha.
But at the same time, it was hard to concentrate on my book. I’d brought my bike along, because sometimes my class ends too late to catch the afternoon bus. It was secured to the bike rack on the front of the bus – supposedly - but I kept peering out the windshield at the barely-visible handlebars like an anxious mother. My brain played a running video of the bike jiggling loose, falling, getting crushed by the mighty bus. It would be as bad as running over my dog, I felt. That bike and I have been together for more than a decade.
And once I got to school, it just didn’t feel right. When I wheeled my bike over to the bike rack, the usual crew looked confused. “You’re dressed awful light this morning,” said one.
“Yeah… I rode the bus this morning,” I said abashedly. Why did I feel so sheepish? Riding the bus is still a great solution. Heck, it wasn’t like I’d driven a car or something.
I continued into my building. Still, nothing felt right. I wasn’t hot and sweaty. My cheeks weren’t glowing with energy. I didn’t need to go triumphantly change my clothes in the handicap stall in the bathroom. Out of habit, I filled up my water bottle at the water fountain and chugged half of it – but it wasn’t as satisfying as usual. So I just stood boredly in the hallway and waited for them to unlock my classroom. I’d gotten used to feeling alive, surging with energy and adrenaline, at this hour of the morning. This just didn’t cut it.
So far the sky is streaked with blue and gray, some patches almost sunny. I’m holding my breath and hoping I get to ride home.
by Sadie Kneidel
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
This American Bike Commute - Part II
“There she is!” I heard one of the students standing by the bicycle rack say as I rolled up to work this morning.
“Where were you yesterday?” he asked as I clambered breathlessly off my bike, stripping off my soggy vest and earmuffs as quickly as possible.
I grinned. “What, you missed me?” I said. “I didn’t come to school yesterday. I had to go out of town.”
“Oh.” He and the other two students nodded. “We thought you didn’t come ‘cause it was icy.”
“Icy!” I shake my head back. “Ice doesn’t scare me none.”
I’m getting to be a regular at the bike rack, it appears. In the middle of my second week of biking to work, I’m starting to develop a routine. The prospect of biking still never seems promising when I’m standing on my porch, but en route I always end up glad I’m doing it. It’s a good time to think. In fact, there’s nothing to do but think. Think, pedal, and breathe.
I’ve been thinking a lot about sweat. Sweat is really one of the major problems of my bike commute. Even when it’s so cold that my hanky freezes in my vest pocket, I work up such a sweat that it feels like a July afternoon. Yet, if I strip down to my bottom layer of garments, the winter wind cuts through me like a child’s scream. My skin freezes while my core burns.
I’m just not sure what the solution is. So far, I’ve been wearing a “sweat layer” – a tank top and long johns that more or less soak up the sweat, and can be removed when I get to work. It’s funny how it’s not appropriate to be sweaty at work. It’s funny how I have to remove all traces of bicycling in order to appear professional – as if actually using my body for something useful were shameful, something to hide. Maybe it is.
The other thing I’ve been thinking about is guilt. This morning as I biked down Lee Street, I passed a Latino man standing by a pay phone. He was bundled in a bulky flannel shirt, a wool hat pulled over his ears. He had the most blank, bereft look on his face that I’d ever seen. His eyes were far away, as if remembering warmer times when he was not standing by a lonely pay phone in a cold, cold country far from home. It was a look that made me want to pull over and say, “Here! Have this… apple! And these… women’s dress shoes! And this spare bike tire! Sorry, but it’s all I’ve got!”
Of course, I didn’t pull over; I didn’t say that, or anything else. I just kept biking. But it made me think. I notice that when I’m driving my car, as I pass other people on bicycles, or waiting for the bus, or trudging dutifully down the frosty winter sidewalks, I feel a stab of guilt. I feel guilty that I’m tucked up in my cozy personal vehicle while they – mostly people with less money and privilege than I have – tough it out in a system in which they don’t have a leg up. I feel guilty for taking advantage of having the upper hand and saying “Tough nuts!” to folks who aren’t as privileged.
I notice that on my bike, all that guilt goes away. It’s true that I, unlike most of the people that I pass, choose to be out in the cold; I have the choice of the easy way, at any time I want it. But still, having that choice and turning it down does make me feel better. I know that my presence doesn’t make those weary and woebegone souls any less cold or tired. Really, it doesn’t make them feel one bit different. But it does make me feel different, for choosing not to partake in the privilege I’ve been offered.
Maybe that absolution has something to do with the sweat. Driving makes me feel guilty because it’s taking the easy way out, even though it involves a whole host of drawbacks that feel wrong to me: using gasoline (and therefore justifying the U.S.’s long arm in the Middle East), generating air pollution, spending hard-earned money unnecessarily, putting myself in the midst of dangerous and stressful traffic jams, getting flabby instead of getting exercise, and so on. The guilty echo I hear as I drive past pedestrians, bikers, and bus riders – “You hypocrite!!” is not really what they’re thinking about me at all. It’s what I’m thinking about myself.
Maybe that’s why I don’t mind the sweat. The sweat is hot, it’s cold, it’s damp and kind of gross. But it’s honest. The sweatier I am, the better I feel about what I’m doing. I’m not participating reluctantly in a system I don’t believe in. I’m saying, “This is how I think it should be. This is how I know it could be.”
by Sadie Kneidel
“Where were you yesterday?” he asked as I clambered breathlessly off my bike, stripping off my soggy vest and earmuffs as quickly as possible.
I grinned. “What, you missed me?” I said. “I didn’t come to school yesterday. I had to go out of town.”
“Oh.” He and the other two students nodded. “We thought you didn’t come ‘cause it was icy.”
“Icy!” I shake my head back. “Ice doesn’t scare me none.”
I’m getting to be a regular at the bike rack, it appears. In the middle of my second week of biking to work, I’m starting to develop a routine. The prospect of biking still never seems promising when I’m standing on my porch, but en route I always end up glad I’m doing it. It’s a good time to think. In fact, there’s nothing to do but think. Think, pedal, and breathe.
I’ve been thinking a lot about sweat. Sweat is really one of the major problems of my bike commute. Even when it’s so cold that my hanky freezes in my vest pocket, I work up such a sweat that it feels like a July afternoon. Yet, if I strip down to my bottom layer of garments, the winter wind cuts through me like a child’s scream. My skin freezes while my core burns.
I’m just not sure what the solution is. So far, I’ve been wearing a “sweat layer” – a tank top and long johns that more or less soak up the sweat, and can be removed when I get to work. It’s funny how it’s not appropriate to be sweaty at work. It’s funny how I have to remove all traces of bicycling in order to appear professional – as if actually using my body for something useful were shameful, something to hide. Maybe it is.
The other thing I’ve been thinking about is guilt. This morning as I biked down Lee Street, I passed a Latino man standing by a pay phone. He was bundled in a bulky flannel shirt, a wool hat pulled over his ears. He had the most blank, bereft look on his face that I’d ever seen. His eyes were far away, as if remembering warmer times when he was not standing by a lonely pay phone in a cold, cold country far from home. It was a look that made me want to pull over and say, “Here! Have this… apple! And these… women’s dress shoes! And this spare bike tire! Sorry, but it’s all I’ve got!”
Of course, I didn’t pull over; I didn’t say that, or anything else. I just kept biking. But it made me think. I notice that when I’m driving my car, as I pass other people on bicycles, or waiting for the bus, or trudging dutifully down the frosty winter sidewalks, I feel a stab of guilt. I feel guilty that I’m tucked up in my cozy personal vehicle while they – mostly people with less money and privilege than I have – tough it out in a system in which they don’t have a leg up. I feel guilty for taking advantage of having the upper hand and saying “Tough nuts!” to folks who aren’t as privileged.
I notice that on my bike, all that guilt goes away. It’s true that I, unlike most of the people that I pass, choose to be out in the cold; I have the choice of the easy way, at any time I want it. But still, having that choice and turning it down does make me feel better. I know that my presence doesn’t make those weary and woebegone souls any less cold or tired. Really, it doesn’t make them feel one bit different. But it does make me feel different, for choosing not to partake in the privilege I’ve been offered.
Maybe that absolution has something to do with the sweat. Driving makes me feel guilty because it’s taking the easy way out, even though it involves a whole host of drawbacks that feel wrong to me: using gasoline (and therefore justifying the U.S.’s long arm in the Middle East), generating air pollution, spending hard-earned money unnecessarily, putting myself in the midst of dangerous and stressful traffic jams, getting flabby instead of getting exercise, and so on. The guilty echo I hear as I drive past pedestrians, bikers, and bus riders – “You hypocrite!!” is not really what they’re thinking about me at all. It’s what I’m thinking about myself.
Maybe that’s why I don’t mind the sweat. The sweat is hot, it’s cold, it’s damp and kind of gross. But it’s honest. The sweatier I am, the better I feel about what I’m doing. I’m not participating reluctantly in a system I don’t believe in. I’m saying, “This is how I think it should be. This is how I know it could be.”
by Sadie Kneidel
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Bike beats bus; car eliminated
Catherine eyed me skeptically over the breakfast table. “Are you really going to bike?” she asked with surprise.
“I think so,” I said. “I mean, my brain believes I am. My body might have other ideas. Like the bus.”
Just then the bus rumbled past the front door. We smiled at each other. “Well,” I said. “What I meant to say is, yes. I’m biking. I’m gonna race that bus.”
It was Tuesday morning, 7:10 AM. My car had broken down the morning before on the way to work, leaving me to coast to the mechanic on a busted clutch. I’d had to roust my housemate Catherine from her warm bed, and beg her for a ride to work. I’d been half an hour late, and stressed and frazzled to boot.
But this morning, although my car was still in the shop, I was prepared. In the grayish dawn light of my bedroom, I donned long johns, jeans, two shirts, a wool sweater, a down vest, a windbreaker. I pulled on a ski mask to protect my neck from chilly drafts, gloves to shield my fingers, and of course, perched atop it all, my shiny yellow helmet.
“Well,” said Catherine. “At least if you fall off your bike, you probably won’t even get hurt. You’ll just bounce.”
I wrinkled my nose at her, not that she could see it under my arsenal. “I won’t fall,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”
Waving goodbye, I shuffled out the door and clambered atop my bicycle. With one kick, I rolled down the sidewalk, swung to the right, and hit the pavement. I was off.
I was prepared for an arduous journey. My work commute takes 25 minutes by car, from my urban neighborhood just south of downtown, to Guilford Tech’s satellite campus on the outermost reaches of the northeast part of town. Every morning, as I dodge the rush-hour traffic crowding the city’s vehicular arteries, I think, “Today’s the day I’m going to die.” But I haven’t. At least not yet.
This morning was different. I headed due east, straight toward the pink streaks heralding the sun’s imminent arrival. Cars whizzed past, but I didn’t notice them much. I was more occupied with the tight feeling of my thigh muscles and the slight grinding feeling of something in my hip. Oh jeez, what am I thinking? I berated myself. This is insane. I could see the bus stopped four or five blocks ahead of me. Maybe I can catch up with it, I thought hopefully.
Eight minutes later I was passing downtown. I was also soaked in sweat. I stopped to strip off my windbreaker, welcoming the chilly wind through my wool sweater. Lord, it felt good. I swerved to avoid a patch of ice on the road. I didn’t want to test Catherine’s bouncing theory.
I’d expected heavy traffic on this four-lane road, but I barely even noticed the cars that passed me. Instead, I watched as the blistering orange sun inched over the horizon. I checked the gas prices at each gas station I passed. $2.97. $3.01. $3.06. My legs no longer felt tight. I felt like an engine, a smooth efficient machine. I wondered how much I’d get for selling a Toyota with a broken clutch.
I passed a service station where a lady in a long wool coat paced as a mechanic peered under the hood of her stalled car. She stared through me as if I were invisible. I passed a house where two men stood, hands in armpits while a Chevy idled in the yard, warming up. I held my breath and ducked through the cloud of exhaust.
I was flying. I felt like a bird. I had no idea how long I’d been riding. Five minutes, fifteen, fifty. My four-lane city road merged with a county road; the buildings gave way to stubbly fields. I passed the farm bureau, the coop extension, the county agricultural office. A lazy train track wove beside the road. I looked up: gray-brown tree branches silhouetted against the brilliant sunrise sky.
One last hill, and I turned on Aunt Mary Lane. I cut north, crossed a six-lane road, and breathlessly coasted onto campus. I craned my neck to see the school clock. Was I late? How late?
The clock read 7:48. My body surged with elation. I grinned wordlessly under my ski mask. It had taken me 33 minutes to cross town by bike, just eight minutes longer than by car.
I couldn’t believe it. For the past six months, I’d been complaining about how impossibly far away my job was. I’d acquired my car reluctantly, and winced with each accumulating mile on the odometer. The tanks of gas, the car insurance, the stress - it was a necessary evil, I’d believed. Riding the bus to any job would take unbearably long, and there was no way I had the stamina to bike to destinations outside of my neighborhood. Only an athlete could bike that far.
What had I been thinking? I wasn’t even tired. In fact, I felt remarkably alive. I almost skipped from the bike rack to the bathroom, where I peeled off my sweaty long johns and slipped into a fresh blouse and slacks. I scooped my hair into a ponytail and regarded my reflection quizzically. My cheeks were so pink I looked clownish. My eyes were twinkling. I felt upbeat and energetic – a mood I can’t usually attain at 8 AM no matter how much coffee I drink.
I strolled to my classroom carrying my bicycle helmet like a badge of honor. When my car had broken down, it sure hadn’t seemed like a blessing. But I guess that faulty clutch was the miracle I was waiting for to show me that sometimes the solution I need is right in the place where I refuse to see it. Here I’d been, racing home from work in my car so I’d have time to get to the gym for exercise. I’d never even considered biking to work because I hadn’t thought I was strong enough. I didn’t think I could afford to spend the time or energy. But this morning, I knew I couldn’t afford not to. As the bus pulled up to the campus bus stop, right next to my parked bike, I smiled to myself. I’d won this race on my own two wheels.
by Sadie Kneidel
“I think so,” I said. “I mean, my brain believes I am. My body might have other ideas. Like the bus.”
Just then the bus rumbled past the front door. We smiled at each other. “Well,” I said. “What I meant to say is, yes. I’m biking. I’m gonna race that bus.”
It was Tuesday morning, 7:10 AM. My car had broken down the morning before on the way to work, leaving me to coast to the mechanic on a busted clutch. I’d had to roust my housemate Catherine from her warm bed, and beg her for a ride to work. I’d been half an hour late, and stressed and frazzled to boot.
But this morning, although my car was still in the shop, I was prepared. In the grayish dawn light of my bedroom, I donned long johns, jeans, two shirts, a wool sweater, a down vest, a windbreaker. I pulled on a ski mask to protect my neck from chilly drafts, gloves to shield my fingers, and of course, perched atop it all, my shiny yellow helmet.
“Well,” said Catherine. “At least if you fall off your bike, you probably won’t even get hurt. You’ll just bounce.”
I wrinkled my nose at her, not that she could see it under my arsenal. “I won’t fall,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”
Waving goodbye, I shuffled out the door and clambered atop my bicycle. With one kick, I rolled down the sidewalk, swung to the right, and hit the pavement. I was off.
I was prepared for an arduous journey. My work commute takes 25 minutes by car, from my urban neighborhood just south of downtown, to Guilford Tech’s satellite campus on the outermost reaches of the northeast part of town. Every morning, as I dodge the rush-hour traffic crowding the city’s vehicular arteries, I think, “Today’s the day I’m going to die.” But I haven’t. At least not yet.
This morning was different. I headed due east, straight toward the pink streaks heralding the sun’s imminent arrival. Cars whizzed past, but I didn’t notice them much. I was more occupied with the tight feeling of my thigh muscles and the slight grinding feeling of something in my hip. Oh jeez, what am I thinking? I berated myself. This is insane. I could see the bus stopped four or five blocks ahead of me. Maybe I can catch up with it, I thought hopefully.
Eight minutes later I was passing downtown. I was also soaked in sweat. I stopped to strip off my windbreaker, welcoming the chilly wind through my wool sweater. Lord, it felt good. I swerved to avoid a patch of ice on the road. I didn’t want to test Catherine’s bouncing theory.
I’d expected heavy traffic on this four-lane road, but I barely even noticed the cars that passed me. Instead, I watched as the blistering orange sun inched over the horizon. I checked the gas prices at each gas station I passed. $2.97. $3.01. $3.06. My legs no longer felt tight. I felt like an engine, a smooth efficient machine. I wondered how much I’d get for selling a Toyota with a broken clutch.
I passed a service station where a lady in a long wool coat paced as a mechanic peered under the hood of her stalled car. She stared through me as if I were invisible. I passed a house where two men stood, hands in armpits while a Chevy idled in the yard, warming up. I held my breath and ducked through the cloud of exhaust.
I was flying. I felt like a bird. I had no idea how long I’d been riding. Five minutes, fifteen, fifty. My four-lane city road merged with a county road; the buildings gave way to stubbly fields. I passed the farm bureau, the coop extension, the county agricultural office. A lazy train track wove beside the road. I looked up: gray-brown tree branches silhouetted against the brilliant sunrise sky.
One last hill, and I turned on Aunt Mary Lane. I cut north, crossed a six-lane road, and breathlessly coasted onto campus. I craned my neck to see the school clock. Was I late? How late?
The clock read 7:48. My body surged with elation. I grinned wordlessly under my ski mask. It had taken me 33 minutes to cross town by bike, just eight minutes longer than by car.
I couldn’t believe it. For the past six months, I’d been complaining about how impossibly far away my job was. I’d acquired my car reluctantly, and winced with each accumulating mile on the odometer. The tanks of gas, the car insurance, the stress - it was a necessary evil, I’d believed. Riding the bus to any job would take unbearably long, and there was no way I had the stamina to bike to destinations outside of my neighborhood. Only an athlete could bike that far.
What had I been thinking? I wasn’t even tired. In fact, I felt remarkably alive. I almost skipped from the bike rack to the bathroom, where I peeled off my sweaty long johns and slipped into a fresh blouse and slacks. I scooped my hair into a ponytail and regarded my reflection quizzically. My cheeks were so pink I looked clownish. My eyes were twinkling. I felt upbeat and energetic – a mood I can’t usually attain at 8 AM no matter how much coffee I drink.
I strolled to my classroom carrying my bicycle helmet like a badge of honor. When my car had broken down, it sure hadn’t seemed like a blessing. But I guess that faulty clutch was the miracle I was waiting for to show me that sometimes the solution I need is right in the place where I refuse to see it. Here I’d been, racing home from work in my car so I’d have time to get to the gym for exercise. I’d never even considered biking to work because I hadn’t thought I was strong enough. I didn’t think I could afford to spend the time or energy. But this morning, I knew I couldn’t afford not to. As the bus pulled up to the campus bus stop, right next to my parked bike, I smiled to myself. I’d won this race on my own two wheels.
by Sadie Kneidel
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Freedom? I don't think so.
When I stepped onto my front porch this morning, I thought I was in
At
But this morning, the air was different. Cool, gray, moist. So humid it wasn’t even mist, really, so much as tiny droplets of rain suspended in midair.
I breathed in the sickeningly sweet perfume of our privet’s tiny white blossoms, not unlike the cloying scent of the pink guavas that flavor Costa Rican air. I breathed, again, closing my eyes until the waves of nostalgia slackened enough for me to climb upon my bike and pedal down the sidewalk.
As I crested the hill on
As I circled the roundabout onto McGee, I caught a whiff of sizzling sausage in the air. Instantly, the Costa Rican neblina became a familiar English fog. I thought of the little sausage rolls my brother ate at a Tesco’s deli in
But now was no time to dream. Elm Street, the main artery of downtown, means dodging streams of commuter cars, buses, trucks, pedestrians, and the occasional fellow biker. As I flew past a line of vehicles waiting impatiently at a light, I set my sights on a dump truck some four blocks ahead. “Prepare to meet your match, dumpy,” I whispered, and started pedaling like crazy.
The dump truck got stuck at the next light, while I whizzed past a coffee shop, a bakery, a theater, a club. I zoomed over a cross walk, circumventing another motionless lane of traffic. Now I could hear the rumble of the dump truck’s engine. Perfect – now it had gotten stuck at the
As the light changed, as the dump truck shifted into gear, I shot through the intersection, surging into the lead. Grinning from ear to ear, I gloated as I screeched to a stop in the parking deck. The truck rumbled past.
As I chained up my bike and pounded downstairs to the office, my face was glowing with heat, despite that cool, unearthly mist. My heart was pounding, my leg muscles were alive and awake. As my sleepy co-workers shuffled into their cubicles, yawning and clutching cups of coffee, I tucked my bike helmet under my desk and smiled.
Waiting for my boss to arrive, I sipped my tea and read the morning paper. “Drivers go it alone on way to workplace,” proclaimed a headline on page A3. Despite gas prices over $3 a gallon, the article told me, the percentage of commuters driving to work alone has reached an all-time high of 77%.
“It’s very hard to find someone to ride with, and it’s very hard to find public transportation,” explains Alan Pisarski, author of Commuting in America. “There aren’t a lot of options for people.” Part of the problem, the article clarifies, is the housing and work patterns of most suburban commuters, and the few alternative options available in most areas.
However, other transportation experts attribute the trend to an American need for freedom and independence. “The freedom of mobility that comes with the use of a personal automobile is something we are very, very reluctant to give up as individuals,” says Geoff Sundstrom of AAA. “Commuters,” he says, “are willing to drive more fuel-efficient autos but are loath to give up the keys entirely, regardless of gas prices… many people equate carpooling and mass transit with ‘a decline in their personal standard of living.’”
I set the paper down. Freedom? What had I experienced this morning, if not freedom? I’d been to two continents. I’d daydreamed, raced, dawdled, soared. Standard of living? This morning I’d gotten a jolt of free exercise, a boost of confidence and excitement; meanwhile the drivers I whizzed were stuck at stoplights, trapped in machines that greedily guzzle their gasoline, money, and time.
It’s true that in some ways, relinquishing your car is losing the ultimate convenience: total mobility, at your whim, all the time. When I carpool out to our construction yard, it’s true that I am not free to leave the instant my work is done. I do have to wait until my co-workers are done, too, and I have to endure a longer ride home as we go by Catherine’s house and Jeremy’s apartment before mine.
But in another light, I am more free: free from dependence on foreign oil, free from the burden of caring for a car, of earning money to upkeep its needs and feed its hungry gas tank. Free from the guilt of contributing to our nation’s insatiable, war-mongering need for more, more, more. Free from the responsibility of the realization that, in order to avert the energy crisis that we are on the brink of, some things have to change. Our definition of freedom, for instance. Our definition of what it means to live well.
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