got home from work last night, cup of tea, absent mindedly started fettling with the singlespeed – I swapped over to a shorter stem.
there was still a bit of light left when I finished. so I thought I’d pop out for a quick 5min spin around the block to see if anything fell off…
“that’s handy” I thought – I even had a flashy led on the seatpost from the last night-ride
on my way out, I picked up my helmet.
“that’s handy” – my helmet light was still zip-tied to my skidlid.
by complete fluke I was all set for a short ride out on a local loop, I was still dressed like an office worker, but carried on regardless.
the trails were in beautiful condition, with a growing depth of rustly leaves to swoop through, the clouds were hanging heavy over the valley, I saw a fox, it was all really rather nice.
about 45mins later I was creaking back up the hill, feeling at one with the world, and I bumped into an old friend of mine, he dabbles in bikes in much the same way I dabble with rock climbing.
he noticed my bike didn’t have any gears or suspension, and he started asking questions.
mostly ‘why?’
my usual answer is something like ‘it slows me down, so the girlfriend can keep up’
or ‘it’s harder, it’s good training’
but he caught me off-guard, and I started babbling about
‘being closer to the essence of what it is to ride a bike’ – I think I even used the word ‘purity’
I feel so ashamed, kill me now.
