Poems, stories, quips, quotes, they all show that someone cares and is trying to cheer up the person who has lost their direction. What’s really strange, is that while these kind words all are an ointment to help, they are also like ripping off a scab, exposing a healing wound, to apply the ointment.

The words from those just learning of the loss are the hardest. A crack in the shield forms every time the story is told. Some days the shield is fully pierced.

When you learn of someone’s loss, please, do not try to find the right words to say.  Never, are the right words going to come, for it is not words that heal. The healing will come from within. Tiny moments of joy linking together, bonding with the new self. 

Don’t tell someone to appreciate the good times. They already do.  It’s the good times that formed their current structure. Telling this gives a state of confusion, unable to determine if the appreciation is enough or even sincere.

Don’t tell them to think of what they already have.  Yes, these people and things won’t lose any importance. When there is a loss, there is an empty seat at every table, it’s not removing a chair.

Don’t tell someone that it could be for the best.  No. Right now it can’t be for the best.  In fact, right now, it feels more like that it just can’t be even real.

Don’t tell them about a loss you experienced. Hearing about someone else’s pain is salt on the wound. No matter how splendid of a moral to the story you have, it doesn’t make it better.

We understand that you are trying to be helpful, trying to work through your own heartbreak, and that you care.  Thank you for caring.  That’s all we want.  Offer an open ear, but don’t get upset should it not be called upon. To know that we can talk to you is itself comforting.

For those that have spoke to me or others in the past and tried to find the right words: we carry them with us now, but they don’t hold us back. We appreciate your intent.  Thank you for caring. Honestly and sincerely, thank you for caring.

We had been planning a homebirth for our daughter’s arrival.  We did lots of research and found a wonderful pair of midwives. We made a list of the various things that needed to happen once my wife went into labor.  Shortly after 4pm on Friday, April 23, I came home from a make-up session for a class and was already late for work.  My wife had a few contractions that she thought may have been the beginning of labor but they were inconsistent magnitude and irregularly spaced apart.  We decided that it would be best if I went to work since such an occurrence could go feasibly go on for days.  As nearly always, I took the bike to work. I sent her a message when things slowed down at work asking her what was going on.  She confirmed she was in labor but told me to finish out my shift.  Later, she picked me and my bike up from work so we could go shopping for an “It’s a Girl” lawn sign and an anniversary card for my parents, whose 28th anniversary was the following day.

After a wild chain of events during the remainder of labor, our beautiful daughter Daisy was born on April 24, 2010 at 4:16am. She weighed exactly 8 pounds and was 20-3/4” long.  It was such a weird feeling to have a second child be born.  I remember the feelings of “Wow, so this is what it’s like to be a dad” from when our son James was born and the blissful gazing at him.  With Daisy, it was different, the “Father of two” feeling seemed so sudden, as if it were unexpected. I was overcome with pride, both for my wife’s strength during labor and for the sweet little baby clinging to my finger.

Just a short week later, all of the wonderful feeling of this new life entering the world needed to be set aside for all the strength and courage I can muster.  My dad, Ingo, is probably the single biggest influence on my life.  A man of great character with a love for simple pleasures, family, and friends. Full of advice and wisdom without a hint of being condescending.  I received a call from my wife that I needed to find out what was going on with my mom.  I called her and she told me to get to her house as fast as possible.  I’ll never forget the look on her face when she asked her neighbor and the police officer to tell me of the worst news I have ever heard.  As they stammered to explain and find the right words, the officer said: “He’s gone.”  My heart fell. My breath left me. All I could do was hug my mom and compose myself knowing that right then she needed me to be strong far more than I needed to express my sadness.  The next 12 hours were a whir of family and close friends coming over to just be with us.  I had our van, so friends of ours garnered car seats, and our midwife gave my wife and our kids a ride over to my parent’s house.  My dad went turkey hunting with his good friend and while they were walking to go set up their blind, my dad tripped.  His gun fell from his hand. He died almost instantly.

My mom was understandably too shaken to bear the news, so her father brought me to my dad’s parent’s house. The hardest thing I have ever done in my life was to tell my Opa that his only son had died.  A strong-hearted man who has been witness to a lot of loss said, “I thought I had seen everything, I haven’t seen nothing” as he sat back taking in my words, visibly quite shaken.

It is still too soon to know of any other arrangements.  I will be spending a lot of time with my mom over the next few days, weeks, months, and years.  I know she needs me right now about as much as I need her.

I am extremely saddened by the loss of my father. He was a great friend. Dad, I miss you. I love you.  Thank you for being an incredible father to me. I’m proud that we named James Ingo after you, I hope he grows up to be every bit as caring, funny, strong, smart, and helpful as you have always been.

Listening to the interview gives me a glimmer of hope. While I think that Kornheiser had to pull some strings and probably take a knee begging for the chance to come out of this looking like he is cooler headed and keep his job, I think it’s important.  The big problem here is that the people that this is going to spread out to are the people that it changes things the least for.  Keep in mind that the 16 minute segment on a local Washington, D.C. radio station. Sure, it’s available online and can potentially reach millions, but it won’t. The people that will listen and spread the link are cyclists. The people that are going to see the link and listen are cyclists.  Perhaps 1 in 10,000 of the people who see the link and listen to the interview are not a cyclist. Lance is a pretty persuasive character, but maybe half of those motorists that listen will even consider changing their driving habits.

The unfortunate fact of the matter is that most motorists just don’t care.  Somehow when they see a cyclist while they are in their car they act inhuman and inhumane.  The same person who would slam on their brakes for a squirrel or wait several minutes for a duck to cross the road may blare their horn and skim past a cyclist. 

It seems like some people just can’t stand to be different than others.  There have always been fighting between different types of people. Some more dangerous than others. Race, nationality, religion, money, political views, sexuality, corporate levels, education levels, the list of places where differences exist are enormous.  So many people just don’t get that nobody is the same as anyone else. There are nearly seven billion people in the world. Every one of them is different. Lance’s second-to-last tweet on the Kornheiser debacle pointed out that the big issue is mutual respect.  What is it going to take for people to get to this point?  Even people in cars don’t have a mutual respect for other cars.  Think of how someone in a Prius feels when they pull up next to a Hummer. Thoughts of “wasteful jerk is compensating for something” and not “someone who has a different set of priorities made a different choice than I did.”  Drivers of cars in general pull up behind a bike and think “inconsiderate biker get out of my way, you don’t pay for my roads get on the sidewalk! I’ll teach him a lesson!”

We’re all in this together.  We all pay for the roads.  In terms of dollars per unit of impact on the road, cyclists often pay the most.  Cycling does very little wear on the roads and yet cyclists pay nearly the same amount as motorists. In most jurisdictions, property taxes, income taxes, and sales tax are the primary funders of road maintenance and not fuel taxes. Beyond that, most cyclists do own cars, so the whole right to the road by paying for a license, plates, and insurance is a moot argument as well.

A lot of wonderful things have happened to the world of transportation to improve safety and efficiency.  However, the most efficient means of travel for short distances remains to be a bicycle.  There is a time and a place for presenting opinion on who has the most right to a particular stretch of road, where they should be, and how many can occupy it.  That time is not when you are behind the handlebars or behind a wheel.

Tony Kornheiser’s mouth has got him in a bit of trouble.  He’s still on suspension from ESPN’s “Pardon the Interruption” for comments made about an ESPN reporter Hannah Storm’s attire.  Now, he’s gone off on a rant about cyclists on his radio show.  Washington D.C. based advocacy site TheWashCycle posted an abbreviated transcript of the show.

I filed a complaint with the FCC Below is my letter to the management of ESPN980, considering ESPN’s investment in Cycling and the Versus network, I hope it is taken seriously:

While it saddens me to know that many cyclists will likely be writing to Mr. Kornheiser and to the management of ESPN980 with vile remarks, I feel this issue is one of great concern.  Much like when the now retired Deminski and Doyle Show (WCSX-Detroit) aired a segment promoting negativity and violence towards cyclists, Mr. Kornheiser’s comments, especially "run them down," are inappropriate for public airwaves.

This country has a long history of culture clash between recreational or commuting cyclists and motorists.  Many motorists feel they are "teaching cyclists a lesson" when they buzz inches away from the handlebar of a father of two that was legally riding down a shared road.  Each year there are multiple cases of the intentional murder or attempted murder of cyclists by motorists whose patience has worn thin and have a flash of road rage guiding their vehicle into the temporary obstacle of someone who is choosing to make heir way to work on a bike instead of car.

Mr. Kornheiser’s comments of "Get the hell out of my way" "Run them down" "And so you tap them. I’m not saying you kill them. I’m saying you tap them. Tap them once." and "I have a large powerful car compared to your stupid little bicycle" all fan the fire that is the inability of creating a workable solution, incites more anger, and shuts down open conversation.  Should there have been any cyclists struck recently after hearing Mr. Kornheiser’s comments, I am of the opinion that he and ESPN 980 should be considered as part of the offending party for his instigation.

I hope that ESPN 980 takes this situation for the serious matter that it is.  Most of the roads were originally built for horses.  Later, they were paved for bicycles. Later they were painted for vehicle traffic, which is both that of motorists and cyclists alike.  Mr. Kornheiser needs to read the laws of the city and understand that many of his comments were ignorant of the law and leave the door open for potentially deadly consequence of the cycling population.

Google has made several giant steps forward in transportation transcription.  First with plain Google Maps, which had the big benefit of being able to type “123 main detroit” instead of “[123 Main St] [Detroit] [MI]” in Mapquest. With Google Local (now fully integrated with Maps) you could begin to search business names or types (pizza in nyc) and pick up decent if not very accurate results.  Then came satellite photos (and the offshoot program, Google Earth) which could have maps overlaid on top, letting you see what the destination looked like (3rd driveway on the right after the big parking lot). A host of other innovations made Google Maps one of the most visited and trusted sites for finding information on how to get somewhere.

At the National Bike Summit, Google announced, and launched, Bicycling directions. The video looks great.  The example cities look well routed (though, having never been to them, I cannot confirm). But Michigan certainly isn’t known for their quality bike routes.  Sure some cities such as Ferndale and Ann Arbor have painted some bike lanes, but recent trips to both cities showed very neglected care and little driver obedience to abstain from illegally entering the bike lanes when obstructed by a turning vehicle.

The problem for Google is the same problem most cyclists face.  There just aren’t a lot of well laid out roads that are suitable for cycling between two places.  Google obviously can’t hard-code direct route from every point A to every potential point B and must rely on algorithms to accomplish directions.  Unfortunately, the areas with the least cycling-friendly infrastructure are the ones who are going to get the worst quality biking directions.

From my house, I have figured out several ways to get to the places I go most often.  I take the factors of ease, road quality, road spacing, traffic levels, and hills into consideration.  I have yet to find a suitable route from my house to anywhere without having to make adjustments. It seems that in undeveloped areas, Google’s aim is to get cyclists to go in as close of a diagonal direction as possible.  While, this makes a ton of sense in terms of mileage, often the time and effort required to save 0.25 miles by making 15 turns is counter productive.

All in all, I am very glad to see Google is taking cycling seriously.  I understand the beta version of Bicycle directions is only a few days old and will improve with time.  For new cyclists, I will not recommend trusting the Bicycle directions.  For experienced cyclists who are looking for some new routes and are willing to explore a little, I think it can be a useful tool.

My favorite piece came from BikePortland’s interview with Google Earth Product Manager Peter Birch:

“With this launch, we’re showing our commitment to providing maps for people, not just cars.”

I’m proud to say that my Fisher/Xtracycle is the first to be featured! Check it out, Sweet Rides

I used to hate snow. In fact, for the most part, I still do.  I don’t like shoveling out the driveway or I don’t like knocking icicles off the gutters. I don’t like that a slow stroll around the neighborhood is impossible to do comfortably.  But for the first  time since I was a kid I realized something: snow is beautiful. Almost magical.  Whether it’s chopped into tiny ice bits being hurled at your face by a 20mph headwind or fluffy puff dancing in the evening to the glow of a headlight.

Leaving a meetup and waiting behind a truck at a light, a man walking down the street, hands in pockets, with a cigarette hanging from his lips, gave me a shocked look, put his hand out to the cold air, eyed the falling snow and said “ouch, rough night for a ride, isn’t it?”

Moving my balaclava so he could see my grin, I said back in all honesty “by no means, this is beautiful.” Sure, I could list 20 reasons why it would be nice to be in a car that night, but the big one that keeps me riding: my view of the world around me is unobstructed. I can use all of my senses to understand where I am.  I smell the freshness of the air that I hear rushing past me, I see the snow falling and taste it’s purity, and feel the bumps int the road pulsing through my handlebar.  What is most at peace, though, is my mind.  Cruising down an empty road, silent for all but my thoughts, I can think about who I am, where I want to go, what I want to be.

Some days seem blunt in their attempts to break my spirit.  Sometimes, the world succeeds and I collapse.  What keeps bringing me back to peace is my bike and the cold hard beauty that is Winter.

The ride to work was short, a mere 3.6 miles. It was down a main road, where I was forced to ride the unsafe sidewalk. I quickly learned that the long way was 5.1 miles of road riding and took the same amount of time. My work schedule that summer worked out to be that I never needed a rain jacket. Without exaggeration, every rainy day happened on a day off. I drove less 10% of the time.  My late uncle’s Trek 4100 MTB with slick tires served me well.

Without conscious effort, I made other small changes.  I cut back on McDonald’s and Taco Bell.  I ate more fruit.  I smiled more often. I spoke out about my new-found love. I searched for ways to ride my bike instead of drive places.

That July, I got a lucky break.  My bike was really my dad’s bike and I wanted one that I could call my own.  I tested out a few hybrids without really being smitten. I talked to the shop manager about a bike I was considering and he told me that the shop had acquired a couple closeout bikes from the previous season at an incredibly good price (especially for a $1,200 bike).  I took one for a ride and it was a blast.  I went for the alley instead of the road and cruised to the end at a comfortable pace.  When I turned around to head back I realized that the ride had all been uphill and felt like a flat path. For my birthday, I got an ‘07 Trek Soho for a superb deal. A true city bike.

In the six months until November I had brought myself down to 145 pounds. Fifty pounds. Fifty. Over a quarter of my body weight gone. Wow.

Just before that Thanksgiving I got very sick and the weather turned nasty.  Though I had bought studded tires and planned to ride through the winter, I chickened out faced with cold rides at 5:30am rides to my new job.  Every day I thought about my bike and how I wanted to go for a ride but never made the leap into winter riding.  Once the snow cleared and my excuses became blatant lies, I got back in the saddle.  That’s when I learned something special about bicycles: they are very forgiving.  They just want to be treated well and they will respond in kind. Despite the many statements of how crazy I was to be riding a bike, I knew it was the right thing to do.

The year rolled on.  I watched my son grow. He learned to say “bike” before learning to say “car” and would come into the room and greet me with “Da! Bikes!” pointing fervently at the garage wanting to go see his favorite thing.  He would point out bikes everywhere we went, in his books, and riders passing by our house.  How could I let this happy little guy down and not ride a bike for weeks at a time?

I sold my car and bought an Xtracycle. My son called it my “big bike” while I made it my primary bike until it got cold and I wanted my nice, light Soho back.  With a mild November and December, I kept the slicks on both the Soho and Xtracycle .  Snow finally fell and after a few days I had a 7 mile ride to a talk on setting goals for 2010 .  The roads were mostly cleared and few shoveled their sidewalks.  I didn’t fall, but I certainly regretted not putting on the studded knobby tires.  Before my next ride the studs went on. I was almost begging for snow to test it out.  It didn’t take long before I got the chance.  I went to visit my mom at her work.  In the short time I was there, the snow began to fall fast.  The ride in was smooth roads, the ride home was unplowed, with an inch-deep snowy/icy mix covering everything. It was fantastic.  Only one heart-pounding “whoa” moment as I slid upright through an ice patch under fresh powder from someone snowblowing his driveway into the street, the rest was just blissful hammering away.

I busted the chain on my Soho (too much chain tension after converting it to Single Speed) and brought the Xtracycle out of hibernation for my commutes to school.  I love going on break and standing by the window overlooking the bike rack (usually only my bike on it), watching people look at it as they pass by.  I always wonder what they are thinking.

Sometimes, I just think about my bicycle.  I wonder why I prefer it to driving.  I feel safer and more in control. I’m not distracted by the thermostat, the radio, the mirrors, the other pedestrians and cyclists, the cell phone ringing… I just ride.

I ride because what I do matters.  My impact may be only a tiny spec of the overall impact that humanity has on the world, but it is still an impact. I have a vision of a future where the choice to ride is made not only because it’s the environmentally sound choice, but because it’s safer, more convenient, simpler, and a more plausible alternative for most trips than it is right now. This can happen. I know many others feel this way.  This is why we ride.  If you feel this way to, drop me a line.  Send me an email to 14bikes [at] gmail [dot] com or leave a comment. I have some plans in the works that have the potential to make this vision a reality and would love your opinions

Enter the long tail cargo bike. Take a regular bike of nearly any type, mountain, hybrid, vintage, commuter or cruiser, and stretch it out to be a master of utilitarian mobility. Buying freedom is a reality.

I am talking about the Xtracycle Free Radical. The Free Radical (FreeRad) is a frame extension that is attached by removing the rear wheel and components, inserting the FreeRad and bolting it to the rear dropouts and chainstays, attach the rear wheel and components into the FreeRad frame, add the included additional chain length and cabling, choose a rack style and ride!

Xtracycle has two main rack styles. The FreeLoader Kit and the Pannier Kit. The Pannier Kit is great for people that do long distance touring as it permits the install of four standard bike panniers (rather than the traditonal two on rear-mount bike racks). The FreeLoader is better for people who want to use their bike for anything. Grocery shopping, camping, recycling, odd-side loads, laundry and much more. Each side of the rack connects to a sturdy wooden board called a SnapDeck (optionally, a more durable aluminum TekDeck or recycled plastic FlightDeck can be purchased). The SnapDeck provides a nice long and flat surface for securing odd loads or people. The Xtracycle platform can handle up to 200lbs of cargo and/or people.

Planning to carry odd loads? Something wide? Long? Another bike? There are solutions to that as well. The FreeRadical has a modular design allowing the attachment of additional supports like WideLoaders, LongLoaders and the TrayBien. There is also the PeaPod LT which is an ASTM-compliant child seat for carrying young children.

I bought a Gary Fisher Monona and hauled my FreeRadical and FreeLoader Kit up to American Cycle and Fitness.

I installed everything and took it for a maiden cargo voyage back home with some other accessories I had ordered for other bikes. As I waited for a traffic light, I heard a woman in the lane next to me read the logo on the FreeLoader and say to her daughter “what does that say? X, Xtra, Xtracycle? That is really cool!”

The next day I went and got the trailer but rather than hauling it behind me empty (dragster parachute), I secured it to the FreeRad using the FreeLoader bags as tie-downs and some twine around my seat tube for a little extra support.

This bike has quickly become my primary transportation. I take it everywhere and haven’t found a load yet that I couldn’t carry by bike, including returning a 6-foot step ladder and lawn chairs that we had borrowed from my parents.

My 17 month old son loves this bike. When I come home from work I am greeted with “Da! Bikes? Bike? Bike?” until I bring him out to sit on the SnapDeck and let him “ride” the bike. I am considering purchasing a PeaPod LT for him, but for now I roll the super-long route and haul his CoPilot trailer behind me.

I am uncertain of my winter riding plan with the Xtracycle. I will be converting my Trek Soho to a studded tire, drop bar, single speed as my primary ride. Most likely, I will put a pair of knobby ‘cross tires on the Xtracycle and use it for relatively nice weather for cargo runs.

After a month of riding my Xtracycle-equipped Gary Fisher, I have come to the following conclusions:

Unloaded, the Xtracyle rides, handles and requires effort very similar to a standard bicycle.
Loaded evenly, the Xtracycle rides smoother, handles better and requires a range of additional effort proportional to the load. 15lbs of load is barely noticable other than uphill, 40lbs becomes harder to restart when having to stop for a light, 80lbs (max I have done so far) takes concentration on uphills and a little push off from stopping.
Unevenly loaded, is tricky down winding paths (riding on sidewalks should be avoided), but riding straight paths is no more difficult than a balanced load.

If the places you visit most are:
Within 10 miles, an Xtracycle can cut your gasoline costs by 75%.
Within 5 miles, an Xtracycle makes going car-free is very manageable.
Within 2 miles, you should replace your car with an Xtracycle.

The most important thing no matter where you go or what you roll on? Ride.

The title of this post comes from today’s Yehuda Moon strip.

The oil embargo sprung a much higher cost of transportation on the ever increasing number of drivers forcing manufacturers to meet the demand for more efficient vehicles and prompting governments to lower the speed limit to more efficient levels.

Vehicle efficiency went up, gas prices came back down and the speed limits were raised as the public rebelled against the limitations placed against things they could now afford to be wasteful about.

Then came the savings and loan crisis of the 80s. Being more difficult to live beyond ones means because of double digit interest rates gave way to further smaller vehicles with smaller engines. Then the Caravan was invented, higher passenger capacity than a sedan, smaller size and better fuel economy than traditional vans. As interest rates fell and larger vehicles became more affordable, the push for more stylish and ever bigger personal vehicles began. The SUV, a big, powerful, gas chugging hulk of Americana on wheels. Fuel economy that rivaled the 1950s became the rage with gas prices hovering near the $1.009 gallon mark. A near arms race of larger wheelbases, more towing capacity, more horsepower and more chrome trim flourished through the 90s as the easy money during the tech bubble began to expand.

March 2001 saw the faltering of personal stock portfolios and retirement plans as major players like Cisco Systems, Yahoo, Microsoft and IBM took a nose dive. Scandels such as WorldCom and Enron punched holes in the already sinking ship. Scrambling to save money, Americans tightened their belts and skipped vacations and shopping trips in order to pay for their car payment, insurance, maintenance, and gas costs so they could get to work. Gas prices spiked just above the $2.009 mark making consumers take a hard look at their fuel costs and consider downsizing.

Already on the market were many of the Asian companies like Honda and Toyota with small vehicles with good fuel efficiency, attractive styling and better reliability that their American competition. As consumers moved away from the profitable big American vehicles to smaller cars with thinner margins, the American automakers took a huge hit. As factories began furloughs or shutdowns, the top-heavy organizations began a downward spiral of feverishly trying to make small cars near the quality of the Asian companies without the trust of their customer base. Soon came the World Trade Center, Pentagon and Pennsylvania hijacking and attacks, sparking a strong “Buy American” sentiment throughout the public. The “Buy American” calls came too late. The majority of goods sold in the US are made of “domestic and foreign parts” which is often a fancy way to say “10%US made” on a lot of goods. So with sales falling, UAW-related costs increasing, layoffs and buyout packages abound, the once great American car industry became a bad asset in a declining general market. But, Americans are resiliant and told the world that they can take away their car from their cold dead hand (the other hand still being used for the cell phone). The oil markets responded in kind, tipping the scale to over $4.009 per gallon sparking one of the best things to happen to America since 8-Minute Abs: a bike boom.

Many thousands of people who hadn’t ridden a bike since they were kids filed into bike shops (and unfortunately also buying the junk at Target and Wal-Mart). Dropping what would be a months or two’s worth of gas money or one seasons gym membership cost on a shiny, new, clean, green bicycle. Lycra shorts? Not so much.

A new class of rider was born: “Converted” The person who never considered a bicycle as a valid form of transportation started seeing people on bikes crossing the street while sat idle, burning $4.009 per gallon gas at a red light. The list of reasons that most cyclists give for riding: fitness, saving money, faster for short trips, fun, fresh air… all started running through the minds of drivers as they made their way into bike shops turning from motorists into cyclists.

What looked like it could have been a bike revolution (pardon the pun), was thwarted when gas became “cheap” again around the $3.009 mark. Many hung their bikes back on hooks and drove into work again for most commutes. The bicycle turned for many from transportation into exercise. There is still hope that most are still riding.