WheelieSchatz Wipeout (or, Rage Cycles to the rescue!)

If anything proves the folly of hubris, it's riding a bike again after nearly 20 years. Sure, my confidence has improved since those first rocky weeks, and I've begun to think of my bike not only as my main form of transportation, but a perfectly natural one as well.

I'm confident enough to kind of tilt a bit for fun when coasting (because I'm basically still a 10-year-old, in case you couldn't tell), often ride with just one hand and am far more confident about stopping.

Still, that's not to say I'm not still adjusting. About a month and a half ago (Life's been busy, so obviously I'm way behind on my blog) I got cocky and paid the price. So did WheelieSchatz.

I was riding off a mini-curb that couldn't be more than three inches high into a parking lot. The parking spaces had curb stops but I thought, "Pshaw, I can slip through those, easy. I'm like a master bicyclist now, right?"

Except not. Perhaps inevitably, I missed the gap between the curb stops (though in my defense, not by very much) causing the bike to dead stop. I flew forward off the seat right onto the mid- bar (which resulted in a huge fabric burn on my inner thigh from my shorts that hurt for weeks) and then fell over. Actually, it's probably more accurate to say WheelieScatz fell on top of me.

I bounced up right away, just like when I was kid, shaking but more in shock than anything else. A woman came out of the salon I biffed in front of and asked, "Are you OK?"

"I think I broke my bike," I said, because that was my first thought and I was pretty rattled. It all happened so damn fast; usually I at least kind of know I'm falling or going to fall. But this time, it was riding-ow-crash.

"Well, I like my bike too, but are you OK?" she asked.

"Damn, you fell hard," said someone else who came out of the salon. Why is it in these situations there's always someone to point out obvious things? I know he didn't mean anything by it, but it was hard not to snap, "Thanks for the news bulletin, I had no idea what happened!"

I said I was fine, even though I didn't feel like I was, and picked up my bike. My iced chai had stayed in its cup holder and I still had about half of it, so there was that, at least. Some of the cat food cans in the basket had rolled out, but most were still in the basket.

Then I saw it. One of my brake handles was bent the wrong way. I gingerly tried to put it back but that just caused whatever thread it was hanging on by to snap and it broke even more, hanging loosely and wrong like a broken limb.

I didn't know what to do, so I walked my bike to the other end of the parking lot. The wheels turned, the pedals moved, aside from the brake everything seemed OK.

Naturally, I called the Hubby to let him know my brake was broken. We happened to have a good friend visiting that weekend from Tucson and he offered to come get me in his car, but I was close enough to home and it was a residential enough route that I felt OK trying it. My rear brakes still worked, so I slowly and cautiously made my way home, my heart sinking at a disconcerting click-clanking sound coming from the pedals. There was also no denying or ignoring the fact she just didn't feel right; I knew this wasn't a scratch-and-ding tumble. I had broken my beloved bike.

The ride home is so far the only time I recall being unhappy while riding my bike. I was less than two miles from home but it felt like the worst, longest ride ever. Unwanted images of the "dead" bikes that hung all around the upper walls of Bike Saviours kept flashing through my head. What was it that made them dead again...? I think the frame has to be cracked; surely WheelieSchatz's wasn't. After all, the bike was still, mostly, kinda-sorta going. Surely it couldn't do that if it was irreparable, right?

It was during this heavy-hearted trek back home that my body decided to remind me that it too was breakable. The road rash on my thigh began to sting-throb and my left calf had a troubling, hot-fire zinging sensation at the bottom of the muscle. My right knee started to twinge with every push forward, too, but I was too worried about my bike to pay more mind to any of this than I was forced to through sensation.

I looked down and saw my palm was scraped and I had bled a little on my beautiful leather hand grips with hand stitching. As with all scrapes, looking at it made it hurt whereas before seeing it I'd had no idea it was there.

It was Sunday and Rage Cycles was set to close in 10 minutes by the time I got home. Fortunately, we have the best neighbors in the universe (that is not hyperbole; read that as a literal truth because it is). They took me, the Hubby and my bike to the shop the next day, where I was told I'd have to leave it for a while.

That was an issue because there were groceries to be gotten and a job interview to get to later in the week and I had to drop off my broken laptop to a repair shop (also conveniently located less than two miles away), in short it was just absolutely not a good week to not have my bike in any way.

But, that's Life so I mentally reallocated the Fun Money budget to Surplus Rideshare Budget in my head and made peace with the fact I would be bikeless for several busy days.

But it was silly of me to worry. Unexpectedly, what with Rage Cycles people being the wonderful, kind, skilled folk they are, called just two days later. They had ordered new brakes, fixed the pedals issue and put temporary brakes on my bike. I was so relieved and thrilled...but I was also on a non-negotiable work project deadline, so wasn't sure if I'd get there before they closed.

About 20 minutes before they closed, I called and said I was on my way (this was true, I was in the rideshare I'd frantically called as soon as possible) to get my bike but might not get there in time. Instead of being understandably annoyed, they said no worries, they'd see me soon.

And they did, even taking time to explain what was wrong with my the crankset (something had snapped; I had a moment of panic during which I wondered aloud if I had outfatted my bike, even though I'm actually 42 lbs. lighter than when I got it, but was assured that wasn't what happened; phew!).

The temporary handles were somewhat aesthetically discordant, but more importantly, my brakes worked fine and I got to my job interview (yes, I got the job; yes, that's what I'm behind on this blog) and everywhere else I needed to be. And I had the reassuring knowledge new brakes were on their way to Rage and would be put on.

Which they were, and perfectly at that.

Now, I am not a superficial person as a general rule. But I confess to shameful vanity when it comes to my bike. I can't help it; rarely has the physical appearance of a thing brought me such joy. Maybe it's because I'm not pretty (no low self-esteem there; I'm funny and smart and a good friend and fine, but a looker I am not) so I never get compliments and people don't really see me.

But whenever I ride my bike someone invariably says, "Nice bike" or something. It's nice to be seen, and even complimented (ok, have a vehicle I'm using complimented). Or maybe when it comes to my bike I'm just shallow and vain. Well, we all have flaws, so I'll go ahead and embrace this one of mine.

Anyway, as snazzy as the new brakes were, they didn't really go with WheelieSchatz. But they were aesthetically perfect for Ghost, the Hubby's bike. And the Hubby knows things about bikes because he used to be a rather serious cyclist. So I offered to give him my new brakes and order different ones.

Easier said than done. For whatever reason, the awesome chrome brakes that came with my bike aren't available anymore. I even called Electra and sat on hold. When the Electra associate who tried to help me emailed me back, he sent an Amazon link to the brakes already on my bike. Which makes sense -- I should've trusted the crew at Rage in the first place.

Then my hubby suggested we just switch brakes, since his were (we thought) the same as mine were. For the record, he has a  Electra Loft 7i. He did a great job switching out the brakes, though we did need to make a small quick trip back to rage for some final tweaking on my bike. The brakes are working great on his, however. 

Since then, I've had a couple more minor falls, but nothing as bad. The entire experience underscored for me just how fortunate I am to be going on this carfree journey with such a great support network. I have a bike shop I trust, a hubby that helps with minor maintenance (and who takes my bike to the bike shop when I can't) neighbors with cars to get me to the bike shop when my bike can't and live in pretty bike-friendly-ish neighborhood. 

My new job is an extraordinarily pleasant 15-minute ride away, and thanks to all of the above, I never worry about getting there.