Bycicles, old memories, and new experiences

https://transculturalexchange.org/gd5hvl27 Recently I decided that I needed to lose weight. Well, several million Americans and I decided that, since that happens on any given week. However, I had become increasingly concerned both about my health and about my Orthodox witness. It is somewhat hard to preach on self-control if you can look down and see the top of your belly. I was also influenced by another priest in our parish who has done an incredible job of losing weight. So far I have had a measure of success.

As part of my weight loss regimen, I decided to return to a practice that I used to love, bycicle riding. When I was about 12, I signed up for a paper route. I used to bicycle miles every week, for it was a small town and I had about 150 customers. The bicycle had twin panniers mounted on it in which I carried my papers. While I hated bad weather riding, and winters could get mighty cold up in Ohio, I certainly enjoyed riding my bicycle. Eventually I stopped with the paper route, but I kept my love of bycicles.

Buy Alprazolam Canada Years later, when I returned from the Army and was living in Mansfield, OH, I decided to return to bicycle riding. I bought myself a Schwinn at the local bicycle shop. It was the first bicycle that was my size rather than the stock size that many stores stocked. It was expensive, but I thought it was worth it. I had the bicycle through seminary and last two years of college, though my wife tells me that she cannot remember my having it when we met in college. I rode miles on that bicycle and thought nothing of it. It was “only” a 10 speed, but that was all that was easily available in 1973. My current bicycle is a 24 speed, something which did not even exist back then. For those of you who know bicycles, I own a Giant Roam 2.

https://www.psicologialaboral.net/2024/08/07/tux40zr0yq So, I went and bought a bicycle, which I have faithfully been riding several days a week for several miles. I did find out some things:

https://merangue.com/r1870i3 1.  Bicycles appeared incredible expensive to me today. Then I used a financial calculator only to find out that the $110 that I spent in 1973 would be about $570 today. So, I realized that I am getting old and beginning to suffer from that syndrome that says that prices are too high. It helped me to go back and look and see that the minimum wage in 1973 was $1.60.

https://mandikaye.com/blog/dar1sddv9cz 2.  For those of you who say that you can still get an under $100 bike at several stores, such as Wallmart, K-mart, etc., I tried that. Within three weeks a pedal had come off, a tire had gone flat, and the shifters would sometimes shift into the right gear and sometimes not. I gave up and bought a better, and more expensive, bicycle. So, I do not recommend such a bicycle unless you are an occassional rider and only for short distances.

3.  I still have fast reflexes. I found that out the other day when I heard some squealing of brakes behind me and quickly took my bicycle off onto the berm of the road. A tow truck went past me with another car on the driver’s left. Apparently even though the tow truck must have seen me, the driver chose to wait to change lanes until the last second only to find out that he was being passed. For a man who turns 60 this year, I can still react quite fast to the sound of a squealing brake. And, I did not even wipe but stayed upright and pedaling. Sadly, drivers today still behave every bit as badly towards bicyclists as drivers did back then.

https://blog.extraface.com/2024/08/07/at0eh01yqw 4.  I still have a fast release of adrenalin that can surge through my legs and get them to pumping faster and with power. I found that out when a golden retreiver decided that he wanted to retrieve me. Even all these many years later, dogs still do not realize that bicyclists are not the same as deer and squirrels.

https://sugandhmalhotra.com/2024/08/07/txqrantj5u 5.  Finally, I found out that bicycle riding is still fun and worth doing. I am putting in about 30-35 miles a week now and beginning to research bicycle trails. Unfortunately, most of the trails in this area are designed for mountain bikes rather than hybrid bicycles or road bicycles. There are some road courses laid out, but these do not have actual bicycle lanes, they are simply surface roads that lead past interesting places. And, I am simply not attracted to mountain biking though I am impressed by those who participate in that sport.

https://udaan.org/m59r1ihkrj8.php So, keep me in your prayers, both that I might press through to lose all the weight I need to lose and that the Lord would keep a couple of guardian angels at my shoulders, particularly ones who might keep vehicles off of me!