Four wheels vs. two wheels

Originally uploaded by georgeaye.
After years and years of pedestrian, public and two wheeled transit, I’ve finally got my drivers license. I have some circumstantial reasons for “never getting ’round to it” but for one reason or another I never quite joined the ranks millions and millions around the world that are, litterally card carrying members of this club. I know of about four other adult non drivers left in the western hemisphere.

I think Woody Allen might be one.

You see, I’ve always lived in places that allowed me to function without owning a driver’s license. I’ve lived in Frimley Green (a tiny town in Surrey, England), Bournemouth (for college on the South Coast of England), London, and now Chicago. All places that either were small enough to get around with my bike, or convenient enough to get around on public transport. I’ve never lived in Gary, IN, Des Moine IA, Missoula MT, Gaylord MI (for real yo), Birmingham AL, or Orlando FL for instance.

So it’s an unfortunate set of internal conflicts that strike at my tender heart, when I get invited to my first Critical Mass bike ride. It’s a monthly event that happens all across the country and it’s got at it’s heart in the right place. It’s also a warm, cuddly, FU to all drivers and cars. It’s an attempt for one night a month to effectively take the roads out of the hands of cars and back into the hands of bikers. Personally, I don’t think that the road was ever in the hands of bikers since the Penny Farthing was all the rage, but that’s neither here nor there.

The fact was though, I had only two months previously become one of them (ie drivers). I felt myself in a tricky moral position. I still love bikes and I love riding them too. But because I’d denied myself the pleasures of driving a car all these years I can’t help but feel an enormous desire to go out to get a big, fuck off, truck. A Ford F350 with the sweet ass doule cab, extra wide axle, lots of extra head lights and room for all my, as yet unbought, tools. I’d have a booming stereo and it would play all Ludacris, all the time. “MOVE bitch, get out the way” would be appropriateI think.

But that there lies the rub. I’m riding with all these heart felt riders, blocking traffic, flipping a huge bird to car commuters, while secretely wishing I could start a nice finance plan, with no money down no payments until 2007, on a nice new ve-hic-le.

I’m going to burn in Biker Hell I know it. The next one, this Halloween weekend should be a blast.

See some blurry, under exposed photos of Critical Mass Chicago Oct 2005 here.

More info about the Chicago Critical Mass is here.