Slice of Life: Bike Riding

A friend's blog recently featured an entry that she called a "slice of life". Like a slice of layer cake, a slice of life is a bite-sized snapshot of an experience, a relationship, or a moment made memorable by the telling. The concept is supposed to be a weekly recurrance.

I realize that a lot of my posts already do this (like funny moments, or a special visit from a sister), but I got inspired to be more artistic this time. More in-the-moment.

So here is a slice of my life that I will sincerely miss after I graduate and can no longer arrive sweaty to work.

(I wrote it last semester, when I began to play with the initial idea of writing for fun.)

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{Biking}

I am visibly glowing, sitting in class without jacket, without overshirt, in sleevless tank top.  It’s October, but I feel like I’ve been through a sauna.  

It's a self-conscious sauna of sweatiness that makes me intently aware of the sweat on my upper lip, at my hair line, and seeping through my cotton shirt. 

I love riding my bike to class for the speed, for the gas it saves, but most of all for the knowledge that I am sneaking in a workout under the guise of transportation.  


What kind of culture do I live in that we SEEK to burn more calories?  Most cultures, today and throughout history, have sought to CONSERVE energy. I feel like a new kind of strange pioneer, living in an age when exercise is more cosmetic than necessary.

The one thing I hate about riding a bike is the dangerous element of invisibility.  

I remember when I was very small, Mom would grab for my hand before we walked through a parking lot or across the street. “The cars can’t see you,” she told me.  

I am big now—bigger than she is—but they still can’t see me when I ride my bike. I think I would be more visible if I were on foot!  No driver expects something as small as the bike to move so fast.  It has brought an entirely new meaning to the term “defensive driving”.  

I launch myself forward, and my legs slowly churn the machinery, gathering speed.  

I love the balance.  

I love leaning into a curve, hearing the rubber of my tires grabbing for traction against the asphalt.

I love the flight downhill, going faster by gravity than I ever could enhance by pedaling. That is when I stop, spread my legs outward like wings, and grin like a two-year-old into the hilarious wind. 

God, let me never stop acting like a kid!  The day when I can’t enjoy a downhill speed-session will be the day I start to die inside.