Glass House

Oh! ‘Tis the season! The season of the dreaded leaf pile. If you are a cyclist in Chico, this is one of the worst times of year to ride. At least that’s true inside the city limits. On beautiful fall and early winter days, crisp and bright with angled sunshine, we cyclists have little time to look up and enjoy. We must concentrate on dodging the endless leaves piled in the bike lanes. Most of the time this requires a foray out into automobile territory where our presence often generates impatience and resentment. Occasionally it is possible to ride between the leaf pile and the curb. Interestingly, the biggest piles seem to be in front of businesses along the most heavily used thoroughfares in Chico. For instance, today pedaling toward downtown on Vallombrosa by the post office my ten year old son and I skirted large piles of leaves dotting the entire length of the bike lane from Arbutus to Mangrove. It makes me think that these bike lanes are really just authorized for the use of bicyclists three-quarters of the year. Maybe I missed the memo…

Posted by Laurie Feldman at 08:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I have a friend who has some strange habits. Smoking is not one of them. Bike riding is. I should also disclose that my friend is an enthusiastic and very talented math teacher. When she bikes, she spends a lot of mental energy on preoccupying herself with mathematical problems that keep her distracted and, perhaps, in the saddle a little longer. Recently, she has developed a fascination for studying an issue related to smoking. She is able to do this from her perch on her bike which makes it near perfect.
As we bike riders know, the leisurely (sort of) pace of riding combined with its open air nature gives one rich opportunity to observe the surroundings, especially the ground near the bike. My friend does this too and has recently excitedly informed me that she has begun to study the empty cigarette packages frequently discarded on the roads around Chico. Like I said, a bit strange. Anyway, she has observed that lots of empty packs get thrown on the street. I suspect she is not the only person who has made this observation, however, her mathematical mind has taken it a step further than most of us. Mathematicians are all about patterns. So she started looking more carefully at the empty packs to see if she could detect a pattern. Interestingly there actually is one. The vast majority of the empty, discarded packs are Marlboros. To be exact, as mathematicians tend to be, there have been 25 empty Marlboro packs, 5 Camel packs and a smattering of other brands (we saw an American Spirit pack on Old Humboldt road last Saturday). We are still collecting data (I say we because she has got me doing it too) but have begun the analysis phase of our research. What seems to stand out is that Marlboro smokers are litterbugs.

Posted by Laurie Feldman at 08:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Riding a bicycle on the roads around Chico is often a challenge. The most obvious problem are all the drivers of cars who are oblivious or actually hostile to bicycle riders. As best I can guess, being on my bicycle on the same road as a car is provocative to some drivers. I can’t really say what crosses their minds (maybe their minds are blank) but I can say that they act as if the roads belong to the cars and their drivers. This is nowhere more true than in a school zone.
This may strike you as strange. After all, aren’t schools where children hang out? And aren’t children the most unpredictable little devils to ever sit on a bike seat? And, here’s a news flash: some of them still ride their bikes to school. So they dodge between SUV’s and monster trucks, with the occasional Prius thrown in, cross at intersections without adequate traffic control (i.e. stoplights) and somehow still make it to their intended destinations, the schools of Chico. Where they face the greatest danger of all: the LATE-TO-WORK PARENT.
These are the parents of their classmates. The people who volunteer in the classrooms, bring them cupcakes on their child’s birthday and invite them to sleepover parties. Yet behind the wheel of a car, at 8:05 am, they become the bicycle-riding child’s worst nightmare. These parents arrive at school and block traffic to allow their special little someone to alight. They open and leave open their car doors while completing the ritual of the morning goodbye, which forces bike riders further out into the street. Then, having successfully delivered their own child to school, they are ready to go. Suddenly they are in a hurry and waiting for another parent’s child to cross the street apparently taxes their patience to the breaking point. So they pull out in front of the child or drive around him or her leaving inches between their car and the completely unprotected body of that youngster. Did I mention that children are unpredictable? I guess I must be in a small minority who think so to judge by the other parents who expect a 7 year old to stay upright on a bike and moving in a forward direction without a wobble or a wiggle.
We are lucky that our children make it to school and back every day under these conditions. Its no wonder that they want to abandon their bicycles for cars as soon as they reach driving age. If we were really committed to sustainability and reduction of ozone-depleting emissions we would start by honoring the intention of a School Zone and would avoid bringing our vehicles into them (i.e. park a block away and walk with your child to the classroom) and would then carefully navigate those vehicles when leaving the area, realizing that the young life you save may be your own (child).

Posted by Laurie Feldman at 02:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)