Back to being a bike nerd.
It was never a phase, mom. It was a lifestyle!
In recent life news: I sold my car and bought a bike!
Last post, I said, “I hope I can look back decades from now and find that it only grew stranger from here.” I may have spoken that into existence.
Almost two weeks ago now, we drove my Volkswagen Jetta down to Greensboro, signed it away to Carvana, toured a wonderful botanical garden, and came back home in the Subaru.
I turned around a couple days later and bought a Tern e-bike for daily use. What felt like a bandaid ripped off then feels a lot less scary even just a few days later.
You see, I’ve always been a bike nerd.
Enjoy these throwback photos that Flickr still retains and will let me download in full quality decades later.
Looking back at old photos, I think I started in on bikes about 2005. At thirteen years old, bikes naturally meant freedom and fun. For me, though, they were this obsession that didn’t require anybody else’s time or input. I had a few other bike friends, a couple pretty close ones maybe, but it was mainly a solo pursuit.
Bikes taught me how to be by myself. Despite my outward community building and networking work, I’ve always felt really at-ease being alone. I still crave alone time and find a lot of comfort in it.
I was a bit of a loner kid. Not popular or remotely capable of it. I had friends, all of whom were the odd kids too—obviously all of us rebels without a cause brought up by Hot Topic and Parental Advisory CDs. I look back on those years and see how shitty many of those friends were. Times where it seems everyone bullied everyone with teachers being among the worst offenders. Half the stuff that happened would never fly today in the age of cell phone video and consequences. I’ve retained friendships with a small handful of those folks still but I can certainly see why I was drawn towards bikes.
Being alone on a bike was as fun then as it is now. Back then, I rode a lot with my dad—that was fun. Now, I ride with Kristy and on group rides or happenstance meetups on the trail. But most of my biking has always been alone.
Biking let me go far. Far away, places I’d pause at even driving to now. I wonder how many hours and miles I spent out there spinning.
I was brought up biking during the fixie age—a bike with one gear, that doesn’t coast, and often with few brakes aside from your legs resisting the pedal movement. They were made cool by bike messengers. I was a little young and far too rural to be truly part of the scene but at the same time, always welcomed. Biking introduced me to alternative folks and the things that come with that: thrifty ingenuity, fixing your own shit when it breaks, art, and all the rest.
I worked in bike shops, read bike forums, rode bikes, and didn’t really want to do anything else. It was a magical time. Even when I got a car, and then a truck, I biked as much as I could. I remember teachers and school administrators being largely unhappy with that fact. Us three bike kids were going to get hit by a car, or do drugs, or think for ourselves. Now I know, it was really that last one.
There were so many great things about that era, both in biking and in early-ish Internet culture. I’m glad this webcomic still loads: Yehuda Moon and the Kickstand Cyclery.
Man, I lived for that daily comic. I’d get a tattoo of it.
20 years later, I’m so glad to be here again!
Biking is still here, welcoming me back in. I never truly left except for a few years after college where I didn’t own a bike. In recent years, though, I’ve only ridden recreationally. That’s fun too: Kristy and I have done a tour and have more planned. We can finally afford the bikes I’d have dreamed of back then.
Now, in the spring of 2025, I’m back to the lifestyle.
Bike people are my people. It’s a merry band of misfits who never truly fit in elsewhere. It’s fun to find those people other places too: in running, caving, and so many communities. Turns out, everyone in those worlds ride bikes too. If teenage, bike-obsessed me had only known what was in store he would have been a lot more optimistic about the future.
Now, we have a 1998 Burley tandem and a 1998 camper van to haul it. It’s whimsical, terrifying, and so much fun. Biking has taught me to be weird and wild and to never care what others think.
I really don’t care much about outward impressions. I love to share my view of the world but I’ve absolutely made peace with the fact that my life won’t be normal. I’m a contrarian but mostly just because I find the alternatives to be more fun.
I don’t hate cars at all. I like old cars, stick shifts, and turbos. They’re fun. What I’d like to see is a lot fewer cars on the road and a lot more people on bikes. Let the car enthusiasts and those who truly need them have the streets. If we all would simply pick up a bike or walk places more, the roads and world would be a better place.
We all have the ability to opt out of becoming more traffic.
That’s where I hope this new journey takes me: propelling myself on two wheels when I can. I’ll grab a car when I need to but I’ll head out into the rain as much as I can. I’ve already noticed that facing the wind feels pretty good.
I’m sure this won’t be the last time I talk about bikes here. I already have some writing planned. I just wanted to honor this change and talk about the context a little. I was always headed back here and I’m glad I took the leap.