This Biker's Worst Enemy

Cities I've biked in: Coppenhagen, Amsterdam, Paris, Sandhausen, Freiburg, Iowa City, Hinsdale, Chicago

Cities I would like to bike in: all of them (excepting London, Tokyo, and Napoli)


The boyfriend has informed me I generalize too much but nevertheless I must start this post with a generalization: biking is the best way to get around a city. Of course, not every city is bike friendly so already I have undermined any credibility I possibly had in this entry.

Nevertheless, I can think of no human experience comparable to the sensation of soaring down a bike lane with the sun on your shoulders, air on your face, and traffic at your back. I imagine I'm a bird flying through the city high above the trials an travails of those poor commuters in their steel cages. Were I bird, I would shit on them, but I am mere man and alas cannot and must not do so.

At night, the city glows a dim yellow and the roads are clear. On a bike, you have the best view of the streets and sights you soar past. Walking is a snail's pace, and in a car you have to crane your neck to look up into the rooftops. On the bike you roll past the city's offerings with nothing above your helmet except the sky and the smog.

This week I got on my bike for the first time in months, and for the first time since crutches. After the painful dawdling of metal legs, flying toward Michigan Avenue on two wheels past taxis and SUV's was exhilarating.  Following a successful stop at the shoe store I strapped my shopping bag to the the handlebars and optimistically mounted my bike.

After the subsequent 45 minutes biking uphill into the wind, I stumbled into my apartment ruing the day I bought that damn Sidewinder.

Therefore, today I will be inspired by the inconveniences that are available to a biker. I have rated my most loathed nemeses below on a scale of 1-10. (Minor Inconvenience - Satan's Gift to Bikers)

These are this biker's enemies:

Intersections: (0) I love intersections. Sneaking through on a red light, or darting past stopped cars are some of the biggest advantages to the sweaty seat of the bike. There's an intersection in Chicago where Ashland, Elston, and Armitage meet. It's a big, open intersection with criss-crossing traffic patterns and deserted surroundings. Riding through with the sky above me and my periphery aware I have the sensation I am in an Imax theatre, leaning back in my seat, watching as the city and sky rush by me.

Other Bikers: (1) Other bikers don't bother me too much mainly because I am so slow I never have to pass anyone. I haven't yet figured out how drafting works, but I'm sure when I do other bikers will in fact become a positive part of my biking experience.

Fat Bikers: (2) It's pretty embarrassing when they pass my skinny ass but, again, when I figure out this whole drafting thing I will look forward to fat bikers.

Kids with buckets of water: (3.) Never ever bike through the low income neighborhood on a 95+ day when the fire hydrant is on. The likelihood is a kid with a bucket will dump its icy contents onto you and your messenger bag as you try to get through the flooding street. And, if you're like me, you may just squeeze your brakes with the force of the hulk, and point your pale, wet snout at the snickering child to yell: "Are you serious? What the fuck is wrong with you? Didn't anyone teach you any fucking manners?!" thereby proving that in fact, no one taught you any manners either.

Moms and Strollers: (6) If you zip past a woman about to cross the street, she won't even flinch. If you zip past a mom with a stroller as she's about to cross the street you a). run the risk of running over a stroller, hence securing a spot in hell b). run the risk of being chased down by the most deadly of all predators: angry mothers.

Garbage or Sewage Trucks: (4) The smell of rot ploughs into my nostrils but the ebb and flow of traffic prohibits me from either leaving the garbage truck in my wake, or being left far behind. So I must bike, gagging, along behind the garbage truck until either it turns onto another street.


CTA Buses: (5) Sharing a lane with a bus is like sharing a bathtub with a walrus.

Potholes: (6) Potholes, especially the deep quarries along North Avenue, are the only things in the city that make me glad for my heavy purple bike and its shocks. Bouncing over the old, torn up road I can feel my teeth rattling against one another.

Doors: (7) Flying open, into your path: the car door. And hence, we enter the danger zone.

Pedestrians: (8) At least drivers know  they are supposed to be paying attention, even if they don't. Pedestrians forget that they are not the only thing in the city. In Amsterdam I watched a drunken tourist step into a bike lane and promptly get run over. One morning I was zipping past the Lincoln Park Zoo when a young woman stepped in front of my bike. I stopped so fast I almost went over my handlebars. Face to face with the girl, who had never bothered to move, I yelled "fuck" at the top of my lungs, again proving that in spite of my mother's best efforts she did not raise a lady. My heart was still pounding as I started pedaling past her. She yelled sorry, but sorry wouldn't have saved either of us if I had hit her.

Distracted Drivers: (9) All drivers are on my top list of enemies. On a bike one just assumes that they must do the thinking for not only themselves but all the cars around them. The advantage of the bike is how quickly you can evade an accident, if it can be evaded. Of course, not all can be evaded. The number of white bikes chained to lampposts around the city attest the perils of the bike and I keep my fingers crossed that, with as slow as I am, most cars will manage to spot me trundling toward them.


Wind: (10) The wind is Satan saying:  "God doesn't love you." I have, on occasion, gone backwards when trying to make my way along the lake on a windy day. And going backwards when half the drivers on the road are all but aiming for you is not conducive to survival. Darwinism is out to get me and I cheat death by taking the train on the windiest of days. I have no intentions of ending up in OZ.

Last time I was at the Art Institute they had a video which featured a biker with a built-in bike lane. The video showed a biker maneuvering through a dark city with green LED lights marking a bike lane in front of and behind him as he went. I like the idea of this aggressive way to stake claim to the road that should rightfully belong to the biker. But I wanted the exhibit to show more bikers: what would the roads look like if we replaced all the cars with bikes? Probably something like Coppenhagen. Now add green LED bike lanes to each of these bikes: what a wonderful panoply of bike lanes would ensue.

Georgia O'Keefe Summer of Yesteryear

Sky Above Clouds IV

Summer in Chicago calls back a barrage of  memories: Lake Shore Drive, the Art Institute, the North Avenue Beach....all of these are places from my childhood which are now encapsulated into my adulthood as I've returned to live in the city of my childhood summers. However, there's a different ambiance in my memories, one which can't be tainted or altered or replaced or replicated by new memories.

Last summer I drove Lake Shore Drive everyday for two weeks in the stifling heat with no air conditioning. My windows were down and as I sat in rush hour admiring Buckingham Fountain and the gorgeous lakefront property I didn't once in that time think about the day my mom's car died in traffic around Monroe street with my sister and I in tow. We were both young enough to sit in the backseat, and I vaguely remember some panic emanating from the front as cars rushed by all around our stranded vehicle. Before I could realize what was happening a thin black man was single-handedly pushed us to safety. I remember him looking exhausted as he pushed our fat car out of the center lane.

I think about that day when I think of Georgia O'Keefe's clouds floating away into oblivion. Hanging above the staircase hiding at the end of my favorite exhibits, Sky Above Clouds IV makes me think of my childhood. I always think of those clouds like the lake: bright and blue, both bringing with them a sense of endlessness as they disappear as far as the eye can see. Somehow the blue lake and the white clouds intermingle to remind me of elementary school summers in the city, when we girls were all healthy enough to travel together to the lakefront for day trips while dad was at work.

The summer of my yesteryear is an impressionist summer: filled with images of clouds and poppy fields, haystacks and blue stained glass. Dare I blame the constant trips to the lion-guarded museum and never ending trips to the galleries immediately west of the grand staircase filled with the Monets, Van Goghs, and Renoirs for my consistent nostalgia, my unending association of seasons with memories, my strong sensation of my past like photos snapping before my eyes with not just the scene but the mood of an entire period of existence. I remember life in impressionist scenes.

London 2006: the dorm in Kensington, hot with that dorm smell; the corner against the brick wall where I made-out under the security camera for hours; roses and vine-covered architecture; the silver Ferrari; the quiet lane; the outdoor seating at the cafe; the culinary school around the corner; heat and newness and excitement- so much excitement I could never sleep; the sound of the garbage truck in the morning and that feeling of awakening: enlivening and rebirthing: the otherness of being somewhere so new so perfect; the late day exhaustion and the sticky bliss. Last time I went to Gloucester Road it was cold and cloudy. It wasn't the place of my yesteryear where I sat on a white balcony in an England shirt overlooking a posh road with a Penguin in hand. A view down Gloucester Road. Late afternoon stale light. Reds, greens, pinks, light blues, and silver. Lots of green hangs over the gray stone pavement.

Iowa 2007: Total contentment. The white-walled house with my London pictures inundating my brain with idyllic memories. Hours spent with Middlesex in Dad's old chair by the window. The Farmer's Market and the drive through the corn to Mt. Vernon. My spot at Lake MacBride, swimming off the rocks. Everything steeped in sun. Mornings at the Java House waiting for the sun to rise feeling like a morning serving customers at the perfect cafe from my memories. Him. Sweaty sex and his bleach-stained T-shirts. His hair cut too close to his head so a halo of white skin poked out around his ears. Lying out on College Green wishing I had the patience for a suntan. A girl sits on a beige chair reading. White morning sunlight. Green trees through the window. White walls and a beige rug. Her face is still and the room is tidy, white and black frames decorate the white white walls. She is small in the scene.

London 2008: Limehouse. Dirty and gray. Cold. Poverty. The man with the smile etched into his lined face pushing his walker in front of his swollen wrapped feet trying to cross the road at Bondway and getting only halfway when the light changed. Looking back and wondering if, how, I could help. Watching in horror as traffic..... waited? Shocked. The smell of bacon and croissants wafting from the coffeeshop at the station. Breaking a sweat speedwalking through the tube with Coldplay in my ears. Life in Technicolor. Reading the Metro and feeling gray and bleak. Dr. House and pidgeon shit. The flat in All Saints and the yellow wooden peace and quiet above the roar of the dirty scummy city below. Life, in its brutal essence. A girl crowded on a gray, dirty subway car. People sit pushed together. No one smiles. Newspapers and the black of the Tube walls racing past the car.

London 09: An idyllic disaster. A confused explosion of distress and unabashed gluttonous pleasures against a backdrop of quiet walks and pastoral Surrey. Still open wounds. A blurry cataract-drawn pastoral scene of a green with an old brick building behind. There is an unidentified figure, a few blurry dots in the background. the midday sun is blocked by a single white cloud, casting an aura of foreboding.

My summers each come with their own impressionist painting, steeped in light and mood. Some have thick brush strokes, some a cloudy atmosphere. Some are a human scene, some distinctly location. They are all my impressionist summers, dominated by a mood and remembered by their atmosphere. Now my Chicago summers wait for their own impression, for which I will wait a little longer as I look toward the Sky Above Lake from my Westside prison of gray metal crutches.