Living a bike life

I ride a bike everywhere. Been doing it for the past decade, having given up on cars in 1998. I've observed biking go from being something I did alone a decade ago, to become extremely popular means of alternative transportation for many. There are bike shops, bike cafes, bike trails, bike lanes, bike culture, bike clubs and activist movements that simply didn't exist when I started.

Yet, for the most part, we're still an extremely car-dependent society.
It doesn't have to be that way. I know I changed my mindset to try to live within a two-mile radius of my dwelling. Shop locally and find what you need closeby. Get jobs that are bike-distance friendly. Housing and jobs that are close to subways and trains. The best scenario is to find housing and jobs that are within that two mile radius.

All these thoughts and ways seemed eccentric a decade ago. I was shunned for my eccentricities by friends and family. I ventured into territory unfamiliar to most and they could only react by avoidance. Or by degrading and devaluing my lifestyle. "Simplicity" became "poverty" in their reactions to me. They became superior to me for having cars. For having houses with garages for multiple cars. And for filling the houses and garages with stuff that I don't have. So when we stack our possessions next to each other, I suppose one could view it as "poverty."

But how much stuff can one lug around on a bike, anyway? We are odd creatures. Even the bike culture has begun the process of elongating bike frames so they can haul more "stuff." Or devising ways one can pack on a weeks worth of groceries on a bike, rather than shopping less or grocery shopping for what one needs each day, as I do. I just need a cloth bag hanging on my handlebar for my groceries each day.

I enjoy being visable on the street on a bike. One develops street relationships with people riding around each day. People wave or talk to you. They greet you. New sidewalk friendships form. These things don't happen in cars. In cars, isolation happens.

I'm still shunned for eccentricities, but a little less. I suppose that's progress. Some of my ways are politically and culturally accepted now.

Time to find something new to weird about.