Bicycling can kill you (but that’s why it’s fun)

At the risk of sounding overly dismissive, cycling is fun because it’s dangerous.

There’s such a thrill descending a hill, picking up speed as you hunch over the handlebars, hearing the whirring of your hubs and feeling like your momentum could propel you up the side of a mountain. And then you hit a pothole or a frost heave and the front wheel comes up for one terrifying moment and your mind goes blank and you, contrary to instinct, let the bike have it’s head, and you feel the front tire bite and begin to track straight and true down the road. That sweet terrifying moment is the reason that cycling will always rock as hard as Jeff believes Van Halen rocks.

The downside is that you can get seriously hurt, or killed. I read about them in articles emailed to me. My first instinct is to dismiss them as amateurs who couldn’t handle riding on the street. This is what is called a ‘defense mechanism’ to insulate myself from the reality.

I’ve come close to being one of those articles. I T-boned a speeding cab on first avenue somewhere before Belevue where a sidestreet inexplicably goes two way. There, I was lucky to get away unhurt and with only a taco’d front wheel. I’ve also smacked into the pavement headfirst at thirty five miles an hour and earned an extended stay in the Intensive care unit of Nyack hospital (I owe you money kids, I know… much love, peace, you’ll get it). The risks are very real to me and I choose to ignore them, not in a cavalier way but after having made a concession in my head that the rewards of riding are a lick of the elixir that is the purest form of speed available, and worth more than the chance that I’ll get hurt or killed.

It is the decision I think that many cyclists who became cycling fatalities made as well. Let this entry be a memorial to everyone who had to pay the price for so much joy. I pledge to ride as much as I can to honor their spirit and I will remember them everyday so as not to join them.