How to rebuild a relationship?

I’m totally estranged from my family. For a number of reasons I won’t discuss here, things got more and more tense until it reached a breaking point at which point I stopped answering their phone calls and didn’t give them a forwarding address when I moved and now, 6-8 moves and almost 20 years later we’ve lost touch.

And now I feel another similar thing coming on in my life. Things are awkward between me and a former loved one. Where years ago we enjoyed each others’ company, I’ve strayed and now when it even looks like they’re coming around I start to tense up. And when they’re around I find myself depressed and watching the clock waiting for them to leave.

It’s pretty horrible, because their visits are pretty long. Usually they show up about now and stay until sometime in March or even as late as April. That’s a long time to be sitting around poisoning one’s mind with frequent thoughts of “I hate you, I wish you’d just go.” And as you can imagine it takes a bit of an emotional toll.

OK, to all those people who came here through a search for “Sage Todd Divorce” on google a couple years ago when my company sent me off to Quebec City on business for 8 months, quit nodding to yourselves, you’re wrong. The one I’m having trouble getting along with is winter.

I used to like winter. As a kid growing up in Vermont I would spend hours outside with friends sledding. I remember going hiking in the woods in the middle of winter, breaking holes through iced over brooks to get a drink. But now the cold drives me crazy. The same level of discomfort that has Sage running screaming for air conditioning in July (while I bask in the 35°C day imagining myself to be storing the heat up for the winter) makes me do all I can to avoid going outside in the winter. The end result is a pretty dismal 5 months spent mostly indoors – except for those times I’m outside on the way somewhere – usually as quickly as I can to minimize the amount of time spent in the cold.

It gets me through the winter for sure, but every year I dread the time more. It’s to the point now where I’m having fantasies about work assignments in the southern hemisphere – or better yet somewhere where it never goes below 25°C. And I see the pattern emerging. As you can see I’m already considering changing my phone number so winter can’t come calling. Except, unlike the family I no longer am in contact with, winter’s not an asshole. In fact, many folks I know really love it and don’t see it as a time they spend with cold extremities starved for daylight wishing it was over.

So I’m thinking of trying an experiment. I know there are a lot of people who like winter. Perhaps you could help me find a way to enjoy the season. What is it you like about the season? What do you do to make winter enjoyable? Make your suggestions and I’ll give them a shot and report back. (OK, if your suggestions involve “Get on a plane to Cuba sometime in February” I can’t really do that.) Leave your suggestions in the comments and I’ll start putting them into action right away.

Even bigger challenges ahead

While everyone I know in person is tired of hearing about my bike ride to Montreal, I can’t seem to get my head around how to write about it all. It was such an amazing experience with so many incredible moments that I don’t even know where to start. The short story, though, is that I made it – 660 km in 6 days and I arrived not only in one piece but feeling really good as well. And thanks in part to many of you, I managed to raise over $2,600 for the Toronto People with AIDS Foundation. It went so well, in fact, that I’m not only doing it again next year, I’ve set some personal fundraising goals – and if I exceed them I could ride all the way to Halifax, Nova Scotia – over 2,000 km from Toronto. And I promise to keep you up to date on the preparation whether it be my personal training, my getting my bike outfitted properly, as well as some of the fundraising events I’m doing including several raffles from some very generous donors. And once the ride starts, with Sage’s assistance, I will be podcasting the trip as I go.

You can follow all that over at http://www.longrideeast.com/

A Series of Challenges

For many years I’ve been fascinated by stories of folks taking long, human-powered journeys. People like Peace Pilgrim and Colin Angus inspire with their efforts and a part of me wanted to take on something similar.

No, I’m not quitting my job again and going on the road with a small yurt towed on a bicycle trailer (Maybe that’s next year’s challenge). I’ve signed up to participate in the Friends for Life Bike Rally. This ride, which takes place starting July 25th will take me, and several hundred others by bike from Toronto to Montreal. This is a huge challenge for me. The distance between here and Montreal is in the neighbourhood of 600 kilometres – just over 370 miles. The ride is six days long – most days’ rides are in the 100+ km (60+ mile) range. At my most active I was doing daily rides in the 40-50 km range and weekly totals in the 250 km range. So I’ve got a ways to go to get there.

Which brings me to the second, part of the challenge: Training. I have zero doubt I can do this ride but not without preparation. This requires a pretty large commitment to training. I’ve already started this one, starting small with spinning classes nearly every day and a few rides as well. When I can (weather/road condition-permitting) I intend to ride the 25 km each way to the edge of the city where my current client is. There’s a pretty substantial hill between here and there which will give me a nice challenge in the morning as well.

Eating and nutrition are being the third part of the challenge, and I suspect as my training gets more and more intense this is only going to get more difficult. The first thing that has to happen is my caffeine consumption has needed to drop pretty substantially. I was up to 6 mugs a day. I’m down to two now. I’d like to eliminate it entirely but those last couple of mugs are being tough to part with. The reason I want to give caffeine up is two-fold. First off, it stimulates the pancreas and seriously messes with my blood sugar levels. If I don’t eat enough and drink coffee I find myself feeling ravenous and low on energy. Second of all, the way I feel when I exercise with more than a little caffeine is kind of like it felt to work on a computer 15 or so years ago that happened to have the “turbo” button disengaged. I get out of breath faster, my heart rate tops out more quickly and I feel like there are whole energy stores that I’m unable to tap because of this. So as much as I like to work with a mug of hot coffee sitting next to me, that’s going to have to go by the wayside, sadly.

Eating in general is going to need to change as well. Eating healthily is going to take on a bit more importance in my life, for sure. And one kind of disappointing side effect is that my tolerance for spicy food is dropping. Oh I can eat it just as much as I could before and enjoy it when I do, but a few hours later when I exercise it turns my stomach to acid and is incredibly unpleasant. Guess I’ll save the vindaloo for my training breaks.

Overall I’m really looking forward to it. I’m trying not to think too far ahead lest I get overwhelmed, for example, at the prospect of keeping up with a bunch of fit, experienced people on a 100+ km training ride when today a leisurely 25 km commute is my speed. So for now I put it out of my mind and remember that the last time I switched from a mostly sedentary lifestyle to 3-5 days/week commuting 20 km each way my progress was quite rapid. There’s little reason that it should be any different this time – especially starting 7 months in advance.

The cause is a good one. The Toronto People With AIDS Foundation (http://www.pwatoronto.org) is the largest direct support service agency for people living with HIV/AIDS in Canada, providing patients with treatment programs, food assistance, and income assistance, all at little or no cost to the patient. But providing this kind of service (Last year alone, they provided over 62,000 unique services to more than 2,000 individuals.) costs a great deal of money and this is where the Friends for Life Bike Rally helps. Last year this event raised over $900,000.

They’ve given participants a pretty steep fund-raising goal but I’m certain that with a little help from everyone I can reach it. Any donation is appreciated and donations can be made online here. I’d really appreciate your support.

Nasrudin the Smuggler, Revisited

This week I’m once again on the road. This time, I’m off to Grand Island, NY. Usually, given the car-centric nature of the area, I pick up a rental car and drive down. This time, though, I was determined to try to find a better way. And, indeed, I found one. I took my bike.

Now originally I had big plans to ride all the way from Toronto but with heavy panniers, potentially bad weather, and the fact that it’s been a while since I’ve ridden more than 10-15km, it was probably an unwise choice. So instead, I pumped up the tires on the folding bike and headed out to the bus station. But as (good) luck would have it, my rear tire blew out rather spectacularly with a loud *BANG* a block away from the bus station – and, incidentally, about 20 feet from a Zipcar. Undaunted, though a bit crabby, I had Sage key in a reservation for me, folded the bike up and tossed it in the trunk and drove off to the bike shop. Turns out that a scrape I got when I almost fell on the streetcar tracks was just weak enough that the tire completely blew. Not, I might add, in a desolate industrial area outside of Buffalo with no bike shops around, but right next to a ride to the bikeshop.

So within a remarkably short time (Thanks, Urbane Cyclist! for fixing it right away) I was back at the bus terminal and was on my way to Niagara Falls within about 15 minutes.

Once I got to Niagara Falls, I was pleasantly surprised at the ride that waited for me. What I expected was a dismal ride through a post-industrial wasteland. What I got instead was a lovely ride on a dedicated trail next to the Niagara River all the way to Grand Island and then really nice roads for the rest of the way.

The biggest surprise, though, had to be my US Customs experience. Now let me preface this by saying that my experience with US Customs near Buffalo, NY has not been great. Other crossings in Michigan, Washington, and Vermont have been problem free, but NY is where I get the attitude. The most obnoxious was when I drove a rental car down a few trips ago. The guard asked: “Whose car is this?”

When I told him it was a rental he asked why I had a rental. “Because I don’t own a car.”

There was a pause.

And then a scowl.

And then: “You DON’T own a CAR?!?!” “No, my company pays for the car.”

“Your company PAYS for this? What do you do?

“I work in pharmaceutical regulatory compliance – I consult with companies to help them be ready for FDA inspections.” (It’s easier than trying to explain all this in a sentence or two).

“Yes, well what do you DO. Do you just stand around all day? What do you DO?”

Other crossings there have been varying degrees of the same. I expected much worse when crossing with a bike. If they were weirded out by my going on a business trip with a rental car they’d surely give me a body cavity search for daring to enter the United States of Automobiles without any motor vehicle at all.

But instead it went like this:

“Where are you coming from?”

“Toronto”

“What did you do there?”

“I live there.”

“Where are you going, then?”

“Grand Island to work for the week.”

(scan passport)

“OK – have a great day!”

And I headed out, shocked at how easy it was given my previous experiences. And then I realized today that from their point of view there was minimal risk. My panniers couldn’t hold much to smuggle, there certainly were no illegal immigrants stashed in my bike. I laughed, though, when I was reminded of the Mullah Nasrudin’s experiences as a smuggler:

Nasrudin the smuggler was riding a bike with panniers loaded full of clothing An experienced border inspector spotted Nasrudin coming to his border.

“Halt,” the inspector said. “What is your business here?”

“I am an honest smuggler!” replied Nasrudin.

“Oh, really?” said the inspector. “Well, let me search those panniers. If I find something in them, then you are required to pay a border fee!”

“Do as you wish, “Nasrudin replied, “but you will not find anything in those bags.”

The inspector intensively emptied and searched the bags but could not find a single thing in them. He turned to Nasrudin and said, “You have managed to get one by me today. You may pass the border.”

Nasrudin crossed the border with his bike while the annoyed inspector looked on. And then the very next week, Nasrudin once again came to the border with a pannier-carrying bike. The inspector saw Nasrudin coming and thought, “I’ll get him for sure this time.”

He checked the panniers again, and then searched through Nasrudin’s clothing, and even looked inside the seat tube. But once again he came up empty handed and had to let Nasrudin pass.

This same pattern continued every day for several years, and every day Nasrudin wore more and more extravagant clothing and jewelry that indicated he was getting wealthier. Eventually, the inspector retired from his longtime job, but even in retirement he still wondered about the man with the bike.

“I should have checked that bike’s frame more extensively,” he thought to himself. “Or maybe he hid something in its tires”

Then one day he spotted Nasrudin’s face in a crowd. “Hey,” the inspector said, “I know you! You are that man who came to my border everyday for all those years with a bike. Please, sir, I must talk to you.”

Nasrudin came towards him and the inspector continued talking. “My friend, I always wondered what you were smuggling past my border everyday. Just between you and me, you must tell me. I must know. What in the world were you smuggling for all those years? I must know!”

Nasrudin simply replied, “Bicycles.”

Pedestrian Helmets are Good Helmets

Copenhagenist talked about a new, likely tongue in cheek, ad campaign in their city suggesting that A Walking Helmet is a Good Helmet. Given the recent news in Toronto, it does make one think a bit.

In just a few days, a woman was struck and killed by a sidewalk-riding cyclist, and a sidewalk-riding cyclist was hit and seriously injured by a car outside Yorkdale Mall.

If one steps back a little, one could suggest that maybe both people needed a helmet (there was no discussion as to whether or not the cyclist hit outside the mall was wearing one but he suffered head injuries which either means they weren’t wearing a helmet or possibly they were wearing one and it may have saved them from a worse fate). But my point is not to suggest that bike helmets are a bad idea (I wear one) or that pedestrian helmets are a good idea (though statistics might suggest so). My point is that the common thread between these incidents was that they were likely preventable with better infrastructure and education. Cycling is dangerous because it has been engineered to be so by an auto-centric city design. And right or wrong many ride on sidewalks because of the perception that it is more dangerous to ride on the road (and in many cases outside the downtown core, I can see why)

The helmet is not the answer, but the question. What is it about cycling that is so dangerous and what can we do to make it safer? When a neighbourhood experiences a number of shootings we don’t lobby for requiring flak jackets in the area, we try to address the issue. Why does our culture look at cycling, an activity that shouldn’t be much more dangerous than walking through a neighbourhood, and decide to do everything but address the problem?

Disrespect for over a century

Bike Snob NYC had a link to an interesting article: The Dangers of Cycling (pdf link) from an 1896 issue of the Lancet.

It’s an interesting, albeit a little discouraging read. While lots has changed, much has remained the same. The hazards of inexperienced cyclists, wet streetcar tracks, and even angry taxi drivers remain very much present. And even the attitude of drivers hasn’t changed one bit:

Drivers of light private vehicles again frequently show the utmost contempt for the cyclist whom they seem to think has no right whatever to the use of the road. This feeling on the part of drivers often shows itself against pedestrians and it cannot be too frequently pointed out that the road is not the exclusive property of the drivers of horses and carts.

In fact, perhaps the only thing that changed is that the cars got heavier and faster with big heavy doors that can fly open into your path at any time.

The more things change, the more they stay the same?

Everything I expected of a city I learned from Sesame Street

Sage and I both really love Toronto. I can’t speak for her, but I definitely feel more at home in this city than I have in any other place I’ve lived including the town in Vermont that I grew up in and spent over 15 years of my life in. I’ve often wondered why and usually dismissed my own questions with “Of course you love it, it’s a great place to live!” but really, I’ve met more than enough folks who can’t stand this city so I’m guessing there are a few things at play. The first, I know, is selective viewing. Partly because of where I live, how I travel, and where I travel in the city, I see a different city than any other person – we all do, really. Riding a bike or taking transit downtown gives one a *very* different view of a city than driving in from Scarborough (or trying to bike, say, on Ellesmere or Kennedy). And of course I tend to notice things that support my positive impressions and gloss over those things that don’t. But an even deeper reason may have come from the fact that as a kid I spent many hours of my life watching early 1970′s Sesame Street. I notice, for example that many of the things I love about Toronto are the same things portrayed positively in Sesame Street. A few examples:

Transit
Toronto loves its transit:

And of course Sesame Street did as well:

Diversity
Toronto’s one of the most diverse cities in the world. Sesame Street always promoted multiculturalism:

Cycling
Cycling is very popular in Toronto:

Sesame Street also promoted cycling:

Street Life
And finally, Sesame Street knew that streets are not just for cars, but for people too:

Toronto knows that as well:

No wonder I feel at home. Kind of funny, really, to think that in a strange way Jim Henson and the producers of shows like Sesame Street, The Electric Company, and Vegetable Soup (am I the only one who remembers that one?) had a noticeable effect on where and how I want to spend my life.