Thursday Thoughts: Cycling and Time

A wise man once said to me,  “This riding stuff will completely change your perception of time and distance.”

I’ve found that to be true, in many and weird ways.

This reflection started with a comment made in the shop the other day.  The customer said,  “You guys are lucky to have all that time to ride.”

My first reaction was annoyance.  I know a little about this individual.  He works a “job” that is not highly demanding of time, and is extremely rewarding in a financial sense.  Further, this man has no idea what kind of time demands we shop workers face.  My typical workweek is around 48 hours.  I work in a “high touch” and “high service” business.  There are a lot of demands on time, both inside the traditional workday, and outside of it.

I am not writing this post to gripe about how rough I have it.  Actually, my intention is the opposite.  I have it pretty good.  But do remember the following.  Any time someone starts a conversational thought with,  “You’re so lucky,” they have no clue what they are talking about, and are usually making excuses for themselves.

Cycling saves time.  It’s that simple.

This fact can be less than obvious here in the suburbs, and extremely obvious in urban locales.  Take this fact of modern life.  Transportation.  We all have a certain amount of “transport time” built into our lives.  That is the time it takes to move from one place to another.  Generally, transport time is useless for any other purpose than relocating the body.  But on a bike, the act of transportation becomes multi-purposed.  Suddenly one is involved in recreation and fitness activity at the same time as transporting oneself.

It’s a fact that we Americans (including most cyclists) tend to look at the bicycle as a toy and not a vehicle.  And yet we advertise our automobiles as toys!  Think about some of the car commercials you have seen or heard.  Many are trying to sell you on the concept that buying this particular car will transform your driving into some kind of pleasurable leisure activity.  How’s that working for you?