So, I Bought a Bike

So, I bought a bike.

A bicycle, I should say. Not the sexy kind of bike, with a big purring engine and lots of chrome. No, I bought the un-sexy kind. Practically the un-sexiest mode of transportation going, really.

I used to have the sexy kind of bike, and it was hot. It had a cherry-red gas tank, leather saddlebags, and even – really! – little leather streamers hanging off the handlebars. Okay, that’s a bit girly, but they were attached when I bought the bike and they kind of grew on me.

I think it’s a little unfair that these two modes of transportation share a name, or at least a nickname. But since last week was officially “Bike Week,” let’s compare them, shall we?

In preparation for a ride on my motorcycle, I used to strap myself into my black leather chaps, step into my heavy leather motorcycle boots, and zip on my beat-up leather motorcycle jacket.

Before I go for a bicycle ride, I clip a dorky little metal ring around my pant leg so my jeans don’t get caught in the chain, I slip on some beat-up old sneakers, and I tuck my shirt into the back of my pants so my butt doesn’t hang all out. Are you picturing it?

Next, the helmet. The old one was a gorgeous red, full-face chunk of brain-hugging polycarbonate protection. The new one is kind of high and pointy, with a fake little visor/brim thingy attached and strappy bits that hang all down in weird places. “Will this helmet protect me at all?” I asked the youngster who sold it to me. “I guess, but does it really matter?” he mused, with the kind of confidence that makes so many teenage boys frequent fliers at the outpatient x-ray department. “It’s not like you’re going to fall in it.” Okay, then.

Maintenance. The old motorcycle didn’t need much. A little tune-up now and then, but for the most part, she worked like a charm. Start her up, she’d purr like a kitten. I’d go out and poke at stuff once in a while, but I was always kind of faking it, because I’m not particularly gifted in the mechanical skills department. I was more or less just showing off. When you have a capital-B Bike, you’re supposed to always be tinkering with it to get things just so.

The new bike has 21 gears, supposedly. I may never know, because whenever I try to shift out of the one that seems to work best – seventh, for those keeping track – everything just starts clicking and grinding and I lose all forward momentum, so I end up just shifting it back into seventh again. I’ve had it back in the shop three times for this already, since I bought it. I might add that this shifting snafu has been the norm on every single bicycle I have ever ridden. In the intervening years since I last bought a bicycle – let’s put that number somewhere around twenty – have bicycle manufacturers not been able to work out the bugs in derailleur technology?

Anyway, I guess this bicycle will be good for me, in the end. I’ll get a little exercise; hopefully it will be a good de-stressor for those days when I’m all brain-fried and cranky from sitting at my desk for nine straight hours. And it’ll keep me from burning gas in the car when I just need to duck out to the store for some, um, soda pop.

And perhaps I can find a way to “bring the sexy back” to bicycling. I think my first order of business will be to find myself a little skull-and-crossbones safety flag.