I'm a few of these behind, but I don't think I'm going to catch up. I'll write about today, because it was warm and that somehow seems to validate the ink, whereas I've written about the cold days enough already. But I haven't written about warm days for months now and I feel I should mention that I wore shorts today. Shorts! I feel that I should also mention that tomorrow will be cold again, so this one spring-y day will recede back into the many winter days. So it goes.
Still recovering from the 'race' last night, my legs felt a bit gummy, which is to say languorous which isn't to say much of all. I took the city route down Pennsylvania and past the White House and out Pennsylvania on the other side. It's one of the more direct ways to go and except for the parts that are trafficky (namely Washington Circle), it's really not quite bad. There were potholes, but there are potholes sometimes. I gave up on Wisconsin at Volta, gave up on Volta when Volta ran out at 35th and eventually gave up riding the rest of the way to work when I finally got to work. At the driveway entrance to the parking garage where I park my bike, I did battle with a Lyft driver who found himself in the wrong lane before cutting back over to cut me off to stop short right in front of me to let out his passenger. Driving for a living, or even a part-time living, is a hard job and on a human level, I have nothing but sympathy. On a different level, the level that has to contend with being a bicyclist who has to deal with wayward drivers, it's frustrating. The more I think about the future of cars (whatever that is) and the future is car hailing services (whatever those are) the more I think that our built environment is completely unable to deal with addressing those demands. For example, the driveway to the parking garage is built with the idea that a driver will drive into it and then leave his car for the day, not the idea that a driver will drop off a passenger and then turn around. It's a different need entirely. So, in the future, whenever that is, maybe we should build driveways that make for better in and out and less in and stay.
We should also build more bike parking. Enough that it's not a big deal if people want to leave their bikes there forever. And maybe in the future, jerk bike advice columnists will cut people some more slack.
When is there a good time to mention that the song I was singing to myself this morning was 'Come Dancing' by The Kinks? Never? I see. Too late.
I took the trail home today, but not quite home first, as I had a lap to do. The trail runs downhill, but the headwind ran against me and it was a slog. Along the way, I saw spindly children- the skinny skinny types that even the narrowest of lycra hangs from their bones- in bicycle racing costume. RVC was on their kit. I know not from where they came or to where they were headed, but there was many of them, more than a dozen, and they were scattered out about the trail, stretching from tip to tail about a quarter of a mile. Bon voyage, spindly bike children.
I felt bonky on Rock Creek, but I was buoyed by Rudi, who pulled up alongside me past the volleyball courts on our mutual way to Hains Point, where we were to meet others to ride a lap of East Potomac Park in celebration of the sun and circles. (HP is not a circle, but 'laps' make me think of circles regardless.) We rode into the wind and away from it, but honestly, I can't tell you which direction was which. I begged off after one loop and took to the exit as Dave entered to catch the group and take my place. One out, one in. I headed to the fish market, but didn't buy any fish. I headed down Maine Avenue, a main avenue in SW and the surface, haven't been recently destroyed in the name of being soon-to-be repaved proved itself lunar and lumpy. It turned into M Street, which was better and that, via 11th and Potomac, more or less found me home.
Goodbye warm day. It was nice to have seen you. We'll meet again/Don't know how/Don't know when/But I'll know we'll meet again/
some sunny day
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