Day Eight Tuesday 22nd May 2007

Riding in the dark...

Wow one week done already! Or should I be saying Wow survived one week! I am not sure.

Forecast for today, Tuesday:
Cloudy periods with a few showers. Fresh west to northwesterly wind.
Precis: Few showers. City: Min 9 Max 16



5 am start again, Not windy , a little bit cold. No rain. Feeling really good today. Only had about seven and a half hours sleep, so can't quite work out why. However, with Tom's sleeping pattern 7.5 hours is a very long sleep! There is something primal about a baby's cry that can wake you from the deepest sleep. It is just impossible to ignore it! I do recall hearing it in the night, but he settled very quickly, and so did I.

The ride to Yoga is fairly quick. Very minimal traffic at this time of the morning in the soft darkness before dawn. Traffic is really a major factor in travel time, even on a bike. Maybe I caught all the traffic lights on the way as well. Then a ride to work, the day has broken and the calm of the earlier ride is taken up with they business of cars queuing up 3 lanes wide as they crawl towards the city. Like ants marching towards a sugary food source. Mmm food... stop for breakfast. Great thing about the bike compared to a car, very rarely are their any parking hassles. So it was easy to stop and grab something to eat.

Ride home late tonight after appointment across other side of town. Don't want to wear myself out so decide that I will ride to the closest train station and get the train the rest of the way home. Get home at 10 pm, which beats getting home at 11 pm if I rode. I think this is still keeping in the spirit of car free challenge, well that is what I am going to say! There are quite a few people on the train with bikes.

Cycling makes you realize how important sleep and rest are. I really notice the difference between my ride to work and the ride home.

I re-think my lighting after last night. Is it bright enough. The front light has a pattern that throws light out in a range of directions. I presume this is good for being seen. Still the light are nothing like car head lights or tail lights.

The rear lights flash and the front light can be set to either flash or constant. I think that perhaps I could find brighter rear lights. Or maybe this is because of the "near miss" last night. I guess new lights wouldn't hurt though.

Riding in the dark is quite pleasant experience.
Maybe it is a sensory deprivation experience, being surrounded and enveloped in the darkness. The calmness of the quiet night. The sense of being cocooned in the space that is defined by the boundaries of the light surrounding you. Watching the traffic come towards you, within its cocoon of white light, head lights appearing as one luminescent source, then the slow, apparently organic separating as they become closer. It is as if you are watching one cell divide and grow.

Then their is the brief moment where you pass and the silence of your space is merged with another, as your light merges with theirs. Then it is quiet again you watch their boundary, this time in red, fade away into the distance. You are back in your space, your cocoon, no distractions just the feel of the pedals going around and the wheels on the road. It is very calming riding in the dark...