your baby would probably be a better driver

One of the weirder aspects of bicycling (for me) is that it makes me very happy (peace!  love!  pedaling!  beautiful sunset!) and very scared (omg please don't back over me!) all at the same time.  Add to this that my sense of humor has never been entirely correct and you get a bicyclist (me) pedaling deliriously up a bike lane (oh bike lane, how I love thee, despite half of you being taken up by broken pavement and smashed up bits of car!) and alternating between crying unhappily (you killed that little cat you miserable fuckers!) and laughing (the sky is peach and blue and streaked with unicorns!) ...cheerfully.

Fortunately cars don't see bicyclists so I can behave erratically without fear of social repercussions.

I am sitting at a red light, wondering what I will eat for breakfast.  I'm a mammal.  Decisions like this are very dear to me.  The light turns green and I roll forward and clip in and begin pedaling.  I've made it about six feet when the road, and the bicycle lane I am in, veer slightly to the right.  No problem!  I've been turning my bicycle in different directions for about forty years now.  Yes.  Problem.  The giant shiny white Range Rover (does anyone else hate those things?) says "fuck turns in the road, I got shit to do" so instead of following their big wide freshly paved lane they roll into my crappy skinny broken up lane forcing me against a curb where I almost but don't quite un-clip before tipping onto my side.  I right myself and pedal on.

At the next red light the Range Rover is conveniently waiting for me.  "Hi to you too" I mutter dangerously as I scan it's snowy white rear end.  The rest of the world sees a white SUV.  I see a small mountain of rancid lard that's beached itself and is quietly grumbling and farting.

A magnet (I love these things!) on the back says "BABY ON BOARD."  I check to see if a baby is driving the SUV, as overall that would explain a lot and maybe even convince me to give this SUV a pass.  No baby.  Driver looks to be your usual blah blah female who is right now poking at her smart phone as she desperately whiles away the two minutes of otherwise unstructured traffic light time.   I lean over and casually pick the "Baby" magnet off the SUV and toss it under another car.  There.  Fixed that for you.

I told this story to a friend shortly after it happened and he was amazed.  "Don't they notice?"  And the fun thing is: They do not!  Cars notice like...nothing.  I honestly think I could drop trou and take a dump (sorry, vulgar, but cars, especially American cars, are super vulgar and you should speak their language don't you think?) on an offending bumper and no one would notice.

Don't push me or I might test this theory out.  Would be a fun headline if I got arrested that's for sure.

you have fucked with the wrong bicyclist

I have worked really hard to control the vitriolic outbursts that I direct at cars that behave dangerously towards me and mine.  

I know that if you get mad at someone who is, relatively speaking, holding a loaded howitzer you might get shot so it is important to control your temper.  I know on some level that if I chew out a car driver they may abuse a bicyclist further down the road and I would not like that.  I suspect that cars don't learn very much when shout questions about their sexual prowess and strongly suggest that no one wants to go to bed with them and so they drive like a douchebag to compensate.  

I know I should (probably) get behaviors like this under control.  I really do know this.

For awhile things went very smoothly!  I had this great alternate route that was totally car free and you would be amazed at how peaceful and pleasant I was.  I even slowed down a little so I could, you know, smell the flowers as I pedaled along.  Once a bunch of old ladies decided to have an impromptu yoga class that covered the entire path.  Did I get upset?  No, mon ami, I was absolutely serene and I even walked my bicycle around them.  It turns out that I'm not a walking talking volcano waiting for a chance to go all pyroclastic on people, I'm pretty easy-going right up until someone makes me think that my body is about to be smashed to pieces.  Then I get upset.  And if I get scared that my kid is going to be smashed to pieces?  I get really upset.  

So it is Christmas Eve day (yes, alas) and beloved older daughter actually has a soccer practice.  We decide that we will all bicycle to the practice and that we will then go downtown and wander around until it is time to retrieve older daughter and bike back to our home for more low key cheerful festivities like wrapping presents and making cocoa.

Often with me I am doing ok and then some car is mean and I cope but the next car that steps out of line I really go off on.  On this occasion, just outside the high school, a big red pick-up truck wanting to take a right on red gets mad at us for pedaling through and guns the engine as he passes, startling me.  I don't like being startled.

We get closer to downtown.  The town library is to our left and also a park.  On our right is a cafe and bookstore and we have a big street to cross and then we are in the downtown proper.  I tell you this so that you understand that I am not walking up an interstate here, I am in a totally ordinary place for a mom and her family to be.  

There is no bicycle lane and so we are pedaling single file (because cars love it when we are single file, right?  RIGHT?) towards a red light.  Contraption Captain is first.  Then beloved honorary daughter.  Then my darling Rapunzel on her new red bicycle that looks totally frigging awesome.  Then me, at the back watching my rear view mirror like a mother hawk.  Did I mention that the light was totally red?  It was red.  No one was going to get much of anywhere.  But what do I hear?

Honk.

Honk.

HONK.

HONK.  HONK.  HONK.  

HONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNK.

What.  Are you...are you...honking at...me?

You are honking at me.  And my husband.  And.  My.  Girls.

It's about to go down.

HonnnnnnnnnnnnNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNnnnnnnnnk!

I stop my bicycle and I turn around in time to see the car behind me give it one last honk.  I get off my bicycle and start walking towards the car.  Contraption Captain tells me later that he saw all of this in his rear view mirror and thought..."uh-oh."  I am aware of the kids and I know he has them.  I know I am going to take care of this car.

I get to the car.  It is no longer honking.  Actually I think if this car could cross it's legs to avoid peeing itself it would.  It is a very quiet car.  I gesture with a hard knife-like motion of my hand that the window should be rolled down.  The driver, an olderlady with giant black sunglasses pretends I am not there.

That is a mistake.  

I do not want the car to stomp on the gas and go over me or push by me and hit my family so in a weirdly lucid moment I lie down across the hood of the car, my bicycle held delicately to one side.

Yes.  Really.  I mouth the words "put.  down.  your.  window."

The window rolls down.  I walk over like a cop ready to issue a ticket.  The words hiss out of me as if I were a cobra and my voice is very low and very dangerous.  I say.  "What is your problem."

The driver knows she is fucked.  She starts saying "you were right there in the middle of the lane making it impossible to get by."

I smile and it is not a nice smile.  My low dangerous voice says "We are in the lane for people going straight because we are going straight.  SHALL I call the police?  Let's call the police.  Let's ask them where we were supposed to be bicycling here."

The driver does not want to call the police.

I on the other hand love the idea.  "Let's call the police!  Let's tell them how you harassed my family, how you threatened us with your car, how you honked and honked at a red light because you wanted us to get out of your way!  Let's call the police right now and talk to them about this!"

And the driver says, "I'm sorry."

And I love the words.  But not quite enough to let her go because I can sense that she is sorry that a middle aged woman is chewing her a new one but is not yet sorry that she drives like a mean selfish monster.  Her car is purring soft classical music.  I tell her to turn it off.  I tell her that I am out here, bicycling with my family, hoping to do a little shopping and that there she is is in such an incredible hurry to get to a red light that she has to lean on her horn and make me wonder if she is going to kill my beautiful daughters just so that she can get to her hair appointment thirty seconds faster.  I tell her that I am ashamed for her.  

She points out hopefully that the light is green?

I hiss "I'm.  Not.  Done.  With.  You."

Interestingly enough, the cars waiting for that green light behind her do not even breathe.  For just this once I have everyone's undivided attention.  I tell her to stop driving like a monster and I tell her that she will stop harassing bicyclists and that now I am going to pedal off with my family and if she knows what is healthy for her she will give us a great deal of space.  And all of a sudden I am done.  I back away from the car and I walk my bicycle back to where my family is waiting for the light to turn back to green.  When it does we pedal quietly through the intersection with the now very quiet are far behind us.  I tremble for another thirty minutes or so but in the end I am ok, and maybe I should be sorry for dressing down an impatient car.  But.  I'm not.  

waiting for the light

I'm heading home from work (again) and I am stopped at a red light and zoning out.  The bicyclist to my left is this tough old guy on a steel frame road bicycle.  We nod politely at each other.  I notice that he is studying me.  I turn towards him and he admits, embarrassed, that the way the light was falling across my face made it look as if I had a black eye, but I do not have a black eye.  He has this old school accent, like what I imagine California in 1940 to have been.  I smile and say some pleasantry about the evening.

A propos of nothing he says, this time without looking towards me, "Do you like cars?"  It comes out more as "Dew yoo lahk carz?"
I turn and look at him very directly, no smile on my face at all.  With a ghost of a Boston accent hovering between us I reply seriously, "No.  I do not."
The other bicyclist nods,  satisfied and equally serious.  "Me neither."

small peaceful moments in time

2013 was the year I made peace with other bicyclists.  I used to get bothered if someone passed me on my left as I waited at a stop sign.  I used to get childishly annoyed if a faster bicyclist went in front of me.  I'd get huffy if I saw a mother riding without a helmet.  I didn't like people on electric bicycles.  There was an entire litany of sins and annoyances that I would levy against the other bicyclists.

Then I decided to stop caring about the actions of other bicyclists.  I reasoned that they were not a threat to me the way cars were a threat and I decided that their presence, even if it was an uneven one, ultimately made me safer.

At first I had to grit my teeth and fake it.  I'd be pedaling through an intersection with the right of way and a bicyclist with no lights would cut across in front of me, out of nowhere, and startle me.  I loathe being startled.  But I didn't say anything, just clenched my jaw tight to keep the obscenities leashed.

And a funny thing happened.  I progressed from pretending to not care to actually not caring and from there I progressed to wishing these other bicyclists well, to hoping they had a good and safe ride.

So it is a few weeks before Christmas and I am on my way home from work and it is quite dark.  The road is a residential one and very bike friendly, both legs of it actually take you to different bicycle bridges.  The road forks and I need to go left.  Approaching me is a bicyclist who if she continues on towards me, has the right of way.  To my left is a car waiting at a stop.  Both of us bicyclists have the right of way over the car but I am watching the care carefully because I don't trust it to wait for us and I effectively have to cut in front of it to make my turn.

The bicyclist goes right.  I make my left turn.  The car guns it's engine with frustration at having to wait twelve seconds for two bicyclists (TWO.  TWO.) and then peels away and a moment later I almost collide with a third bicycle.  I am spooked because I pride myself on seeing everything around me and I have zero clue where this guy came from.  Zero.  I swerve around him and I say nothing and I feel no hostility, I'm just trying to get around and on my way and not have a collision.

The dark mystery bicyclist is now just behind me and he says in a self-deprecating way, "A light would probably have made that easier."  I turn to look at him.  He's a young guy in office like clothes on an ordinary bicycle.  I say "Lights help, yes."  And then.  "I think I have an extra.  Want one?"

He can't believe it.  He's ridiculously happy.  He tells me he had a light but someone stole it and he hadn't replaced it.  I show him how the neoprene ones  go on and off very easily.  We turn the light on.  It flashes a happy red.  He thanks me profusely.  He tells me that he was attending Stanford Medical school but is on leave to develop a drug that he thinks will halt the progression of a rare disease.  I tell him, gently, that this is all the more reason to have lights on his bicycle.  He agrees and we ride together for awhile and he thanks me so often it gets embarrassing.

If you have not already, turn and make peace with the bicyclists around you.  They are the ones with whom you truly share the road.  The forces lined up against us are too strong for us to be able to tolerate being divided.  We belong together.    

my suffer face

In the last year or so I have made use of one particular social platform in a low key way.  I use it to surround myself with bicyclists.  They're like a warm rug you can pull around yourself.  I don't contribute a lot, I just like to see the photos they put up - generally stuff like "me, on my bicycle" "my bicycle" and "me commuting on my bicycle."  I have a strong bias towards bicycle commuters.  I ride a road bike and I like being fast but for me, it's a commuting thing first and a love of bicycling thing second and everything else is mostly not there at all.  The cyclecross racers, and the roadie racers post pictures of their "suffer face."  It is a picture of them frowning mightily as they struggle bravely forward.  I get it, I used to have something similar when  ran road races and I was trying so hard to finish fast.  But commuting is different, I may work hard up hill or be fast but I don't suffer, or at least I don't suffer in that physical way.

I suffer in other ways.

Louis CK ran this great piece about not giving his kids cell phones because he thought it disconnected them from reality.  He goes on to talk about his experience being in his car and hearing a song and feeling terribly lonely and afraid and he wants to text everyone he knows but instead he feels the grief and cries and then feels better.  He's very funny and in my opinion spot on so if you have not seen the bit check it out.

In the morning I am very busy, I have to work with my husband to get the girls up.  I read to them.  The Contraption Captain makes breakfast and I pack lunches. Hair is braided and the day is discussed and I tidy up clutter and start laundry and clean the cat box.  At work I go to meetings, fix broken hardware, find problems, write documentation and...other stuff.  My mind is occupied at all times and when it is not occupied it wants something mindless to do because mindless-ness pushes back things I'd rather not think about.  Like my friend E.

I've known E for nearly twenty years, and we've shared many Thanksgivings.  She took care of my oldest when I was delivering my youngest and my oldest had never been away from home for the night but she had a fantastic time.  E and her husband D stayed friends with me when I split from my partner.  More importantly they stayed close to my kids who loved them.  About this time last year I got email that E had a brain tumor.  I Googled for it right away of course and it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that basically no one survived this kind of tumor at that stage in the game.  I hoped for different but I did not get different, and as I write this she is dying at her home surrounded by her husband and daughters and many friends.

I don't think about E when I am clearing up the dinner plates or when I am paying the bills I push the thoughts away of how I feel about her being afraid, of how frightened I am by the idea that her brain is swelling and her head hurts her.  I push the thoughts away up until I am riding my bicycle along some quiet stretch and then the thoughts come to me that E is dying, that I am far away, that there is nothing i can fix and little comfort I can provide.  The sorrow I feel is tempered by the steady up and down of my feet as I pedal and pedal and pedal.  It is as if my body assures me that something always goes on, even when something else is stopping.  I am alone as bicyclists are alone, not really seen by the world around them and the sorrow I feel about E touches the deeper sorrow of knowing that everyone I know will one day die, that my children are not immortal, that there is a great deal of pain in the world.  The corners of my mouth pull down and it probably looks pretty comical on a middle-aged lady biking as fast as she can, her eyes welling up.  My suffer face.

After awhile I start to feel better.  Nothing has changed but somehow you feel better able to accept what is happening, the things you cannot control, the sadness that exists, the wrongs you have done.  I keep pedaling and my mind is mostly emptied out and I watch for the cars at intersections and I am quiet.

a life without walls

I see a lot of the same people each day on my commute and there is definitely a favorite.  I think I prefer this bicyclist because he has a generous and ready smile.  We are always traveling in opposite directions.  We have never stopped to talk.  As we pass each other we wave or yell "good evening" or "nice weather" or "so windy!"  He noticed when I no longer pulled a kid wagon "WHERE IS THE WAGON?" and I noticed when his kids also had gone off to kindergarten "GROWING UP SO FAST" and then it was just him on the way to (I presume) his office.

A few weeks back the Contraption Captain was pedaling with me into the office and we saw this bicyclist and as we passed each other I called out "THIS IS MY HUSBAND" and he smiled and waved.

I saw the bicyclist again as I went in to work yesterday and as we passed each other he said "I ENJOYED MEETING YOUR HUSBAND!"

I was delighted and amused the rest of the way home and then today I was reminded of that moment as I read this article.  Cars do not do a good job of seeing bicycles and bicyclists are prevented from seeing much of what is in the car but almost everything else is seen, and considered, and on a lucky day, also understood.

dial 1-800 when I want your opinion I'll give it to you Mr. and MRs. SUV

This year Rapunzel started 4th grade, which means she starts at a new school.  Pele' started her freshman year in High School, so two new schools and two new commutes.

Rapunzel has been planning her commute for the last year.  She now walks to school and walks home afterwards unaccompanied by doting parents.  She informed us months ago, politely, that she would prefer to walk by herself and so we accompany her to the end of the driveway and hug and kiss her and then she sets out alone.

My father can't entirely get past this.

Father:  "does she run all the way to school?"
Me:  "I'm not there so I don't know."
Father:  "does she meet up with friends?"
Me:  "Well, I'm not sure actually, maybe sometimes?"

This solo behavior is in contrast to Pele' who liked the company of a parent even when she was not feeling very talkative and was always walked to school and was usually holding hands damn the torpedoes or any sneering teenagers.  Pele' has zero patience for sneering teenagers, demonstrating that at least one of my "you can go fuck yourself" genes will stay in the gene pool after I am gone.

I asked Rapunzel at one point about why she wanted to be alone (probably because I had paranoid thoughts that she did not want her peers to realize that the two weirdos in the area were her parents)  and she said, in a very civilized way, that being along gave a person a different perspective, one she enjoyed from time to time.  Maybe she is embarrassed by her two weirdo parents in which case I think it is extra classy that she considered our feelings so nicely in her response.  Rapunzel, if you ever see this and you were embarrassed?  Totally ok.  I embarrass myself some days.

So Rapunzel walks to school.  Check.  Cue Pele'.

Pele's high school is about four miles away and she is taking an extra elective which means she has to be there at the ass-crack of dawn.  We confer and after much hemming and hawing during which I consider the route (mostly ok for the US but not separated from cars beyond an occasional bicycle lane and including two nasty-ass intersections) and the hour (see ass-crack comment) we decide on her talking the city bus which stops conveniently near to our home.  Tada.  Contraption Captain works out the schedule and on day one of school she marches out to get the bus to school.  What could be more normal?

Yeah well this is the US where our city buses run on a best effort basis.   She sits out there and waits and nothing happens. She waits.  Nothing.  She waits.  Did I mention that Pele' is mildly obsessed with punctuality?  Pele' is mildly obsessed with punctuality.  Possibly a lot obsessed.  She and Contraption come running home totally breathless and if you think she gets in the car you are mistaken.  They get on their bicycles and she is escorted off to school and just makes it, go team.

The next day we tried and struck out on the bus again and by day 4 were were pretty well trained to bicycle.  If Contraption Captain is not available to ride her home she rides in to school on the back of his bicycle (recall it is giant and recumbent and comfortable for riding) and takes the (over-crowded) bus home and if he is available to assist (most days) she rides her bicycle in and rides her bicycle home with him again.

This raises the obvious question of "why does she need anyone to ride with her at all?"  The easy answer is "she prefers the company and feels safer with company."  The less easy answer is that I'm scared for her to ride by herself.  I'm scared some asshole will kill my daughter with their SUV.

Some people think this is silly of me.  I was at a soccer game a few weeks ago and this mother who has a kid at the same school asked how Pele' got to school.  I said we had tried the bus but it had been unreliable etc. etc. and so we were bicycling but that was nerve-wreacking also yet Contraption was accompanying her.  She didn't understand why I was worried about the route and repeated that we lived very close.  She said "you can bicycle of course, it is easy for you, for us it is too far."  I said that I was worried about the car traffic at El Camino and she looked blank.  She explained, more severely this time, "For us it is too far of course but for you, a very easy ride."

I smiled politely and said nothing else.

What I wanted to say was "I wish everyone who was driving their kid in to school but thought my kid should bicycle and who had no idea why that might make me nervous would park their SUV on a steep hill, release the parking brake, and then run in front and lie down so their own car could roll slowly over them."  Because fuck you lady.  Fuck you lady because I have biked past your house many times, it's hardly too far and your kid doesn't even have an early class, she's just a lazy fuck and so are you.  Fuck all of you who do jack shit but enjoy telling me that what I do is easy or not enough or too protective or whatever the fuck your problem is.

I feel better now, thanks.    

I told you about Rapunzel in an effort to show that my anxiety has a single focus:  death by automobile.  My 9 year old walks to school solo and I am cool and not obsessing.  I know it's a decent neighborhood.  I know she can look after herself.  I know she can stay out of the road.  There is risk to all things but the risk created by Rapunzel walking to and from school is not far from the risk of getting out of bed on a cold day.

The risk to people on bicycles is real.  Redwood City Girl died last year on a "safe" route and was even held at fault for dying.  An experienced bicyclist was just killed by a delivery truck who turned left into her in an area where bicyclists love to swarm and train.  The conclusion from that death was "maybe we should ban bicyclists from Skyline."  As a friend said "How come the answer is never to ban the cars?"

As long as this country continues to take such a lackadaisical  attitude towards the safety of our children on their way to school (and their parents and other relatives on their way to work or the store or wherever) I have to be the one who does the due diligence.  Maybe I can sort a route I feel ok about.  I hope so.  But right now I have her bicycling and I have a set of experienced adult eyes watching for her and that's what I need to feel ok about this.