Member-only story
My Journey as a Bicycle Commuter
This has been one of the great joys — and biggest challenges — of my life
It was the height of the short-lived “go green” trend, around 2010 when I decided to take bicycle commuting seriously. I’d always been an avid cyclist. In my twenties, I biked 10 miles a day and sometimes 30 miles on a Saturday, if my ass could handle being in my gel saddle for that long.
But I’d never considered until then that I could use my bike for more than just working out. I never imagined I would one day be riding it in my regular clothing or as a way to get to the store. It was not a mentality I was familiar with.
I think that’s common for many Americans. I grew up in Los Angeles, where travel always involved a vehicle and at least a short stretch on a freeway. Then we moved a few times to different states, and lived in rural areas from then on. Trips into the city for groceries took at least 30 minutes just to arrive at our destination. When we first moved to the house in which my mother still lives, it was a three hour drive to the nearest Costco.
But I had moved into the suburbs in my thirties and my neighborhood had pretty close access to my grocery store, bank, and the library. Why not give it a try, I thought.
I was excited…but also scared.
I was so scared to try bicycle commuting those first few months. I knew the bicycle laws inside and out — but drivers often did not. For instance, I was often yelled at for crossing an intersection with a green light as if I was a car — which is what the law says a bicyclist is supposed to do.
“You’re supposed to wait for the pedestrian signal and use the crosswalk, you dumb bitch!” someone lovingly yelled to me once. Which is not true, at all. One can do that, while walking one’s bicycle. But if you’re on it, in my state, you behave as if you are in a car, up to and including taking up space in the left-turn lane.
That’s what it was, I think — the reason I was so scared. As a cyclist, you have to take up space in a totally unprotected way (no giant metal vehicle to protect you) on a road where people drive fast and do not want to share space with slower-moving objects.
