My White Bicycle

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No, I'm not referring to that Tomorrow song from the 60's. This is not a pop-culture reference. This is not a subculture reference either. Puff the Magic Dragon is shot down ages ago and pixie dust does not make people fly even if they'd think of all the happy thoughts they could ever imagine.

This is about my white bicycle and how I love it.

It was already a used-up piece of junk when I bought it, probably seen five or ten years of use and misuse. I might have paid a too high price for it considering it's condition. The fact that it was white -ish didn't really matter, since back then I didn't know there was a song about a white bicycle. Or at least I wasn't conscious about it. I just needed a bicycle. Not that much, but getting to ride a bicycle is a lot like being in love. Or making love to a beautiful woman. Or freedom. The imagery of car commercials is that of freedom, and has been that, from the very beginning. Why not. You're free to roam vast tracts of land in a very brief time, having to worry only about the price of a gallon. Perhaps you could worry about the price of blood that somebody else has paid for that gallon, or about giving your contribution to the smothering of the world, but most people probably don't. 'Cause it's freedom. Liberty bell's sweet ringing in honks of the car horns. Nothing but blue skies and the road ahead of you. Never mind if you can't see the Hollywood sign for the smog. Never mind and it's the least of worries, the chinese are coming, the whatyou'dcall'em people from India, since you can't call them indians thanks to Columbus, but they're coming as well. Or merrily walking their way into the automobile shop. Because it's freedom. And who are we to deny individual freedom, even from their masses.

But I love my white bicycle. I'm loving it to pieces. The piece of scrap's probably as old as I am and even if I'm not old, it's a lot for a hunk of junk, and quite a lot for a magnificent piece of engineering as well. It's so old that it's fallen to pieces because of metal fatigue. The pedals have broken, both of them once; stainless steel snapped in two when I've pedaled uphill. Almost neutered myself. I think the cross bar is a deviously planned method of population control. Dind't get me though. Both wheel's rims have gotten twisted and bent, spokes have come flying off. The paint is flaking, rust is overwhelming the frame slowly and some of the weldings don't hold anymore. But it works. It's a bicycle. It's freedom. It's love. So when it's really starting to fall apart so that it won't work anymore, I get it repaired. Some of the things in life just can't be replaced that easily. I've fallen off of it a couple of times, it's almost made me a eunuch, it's falling apart, but whenever I need to, I get back on it again and ride to the sunset. Lonely rider, knight in shining armour on his white steed. My white bicycle. My Rocinante.

I have had other bikes as well. I have to confess. One memory that has stuck to my mind about riding a bicycle, at the time when I was on the verge of manhood, I was in good speed, going downhill and all of a sudden someone comes right on my way from behind a corner. I braked. I turned the front wheel. I flew over the handlebar. Time slowed down. My face hit the ground, my feet still flopping in the air, plowing the pavement with my face and all I could think of was how the time seemed to slow down, just like my history teacher had told it would when he was in a car crash, and how interesting it was to see the asphalt scratching the lenses of my eyeglasses. My front tooth pierced my upper lip and it's tip shattered. Three stiches, so not that bad. Didn't break my nose. But still. "My face! Aagh! My face!" And as I lifted myself up to sit in a seiza position, picking up the pieces of my tooth, the thing that worried me most was getting blood on my jeans. Must've had a slight concussion. But in hindsight it was kind of fun all in all. I don't miss that bicycle, it's lying somewhere, almost forgotten, waiting to be disposed of, but it was the first bicycle with which I fell in love with the freedom, the speed and the wind humming in my ears. Now I love my white bicycle. I love it to pieces.