A few years ago my son asked, "Dad, why have you focused so much energy on the bicycle and cycling?" I didn't give him a good answer then...I'm sure I said something like; I didn't want to spend my life producing beer or, I'm allergic to chalk dust and teacher's lounges.
I woke up on a Tuesday....after a long bicycle ride on Monday...with the answer. The bicycle is symbol of Respect. Respect for each other and Respect for the environment. The bicycle can be a therapeutic tool. Cycling teaches us what to do with hills and headwinds. The whole body gains a "cyclical knowledge"...each bone, muscle and organ contributing and demanding cooperation and action. I'm not so sure he would have understood these concepts ten years ago but, I'll bet he would now.
Twenty years of actively selling bicycles to my community (which covers Northeastern California) and forty years of promoting, publishing and waxing poetic about cycling (and where that effort will take you in life), I've finally figured out a way to describe what I'm up to by focusing on bicycles and cycling.
To think that I could make a fair living by promoting the bicycle and it's use, is really something special. The promotion of cycling and bicycles in my region is a humble pursuit...I have only convinced a handful of souls that the daily use of the bicycle is a worthwhile investment of their time. It's a start.
When the price of a gallon of gasoline tops $4 my job becomes a lot easier. The rewards are so obvious. It's still a puzzle to me, why wouldn't half of my neighbors be riding bicycles around town when errands call? Don't they see that firing up the motorcar or heavy hauler truck is expensive, unnecessary and harmful to the rest of us?
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