When dealing with biking, this blog tends to focus on the bliss, not the bumps and grinds. Honestly, that's the way I experience it. But it may not ring true to people worried about sweat and car doors and pot holes and flats, who'd ride if only things were a bit more perfect, or the trip shorter, or all the cars on another planet.
So, yes, there are dangerous stretches, inattentive drivers, chains that fall off, an occasional loose dog. But mostly, it's the pavement.
Here's a "bike lane" I often pick up on one route home. The photo may explain why some cyclists are out there in the traffic instead of hugging the right edge of the street.
Heading the other way, in my only direct route toward the city, I pass this spot nearly every day.
I know the hole in the pavement is there, but imagine the unwary rider, post rain, pressed toward the puddle by four whizzing lanes of traffic.
Better to get a little wet than clipped by a mirror, right?
Most of the time, though, you can look around. You can experience your city fresh, smell the bagels, feel the subtle changes in temperature when you ride through a depression, pick up a lost toy or an odd bit of metal, hear cardinals in the bushes or watch a mother cat weave through a flower garden with her kitten held by the scruff. Stop to try that little cafe or follow a different street that also goes where you're going.
I remember this from my running days: Proselytizers are tiresome. Fanatics should be herded together where they can entertain each other and leave the rest of us alone.
I don't really care what you do.
As long as it works for you, drive, walk, take the bus, try out a jet pack, hail a cab. Haul the kids in the minivan. Stay home and telecommute. Hitch hike. Swing from tree to tree. Save gas and reduce emissions if you can, but don't renounce the car out of sainthood or just to save the polar bears.
There's a world outside the capsule, though. Your world.
