What Am I Doing?
This blog is one part bike activism, one part grad school procrastination, and four parts love for the sensory experience of bike commuting. I’ve been living in the St Johns neighborhood of Portland (OR) off and on for four years; ever since moving to Portland permanently in 2005, I’ve been getting around by bike.
Many bike blogs focus on the technical aspects of bike building and maintenance, or on training, racing, and touring. The fact is, I don’t know a damn thing about how bikes are constructed– it’s all I can do to keep my tires inflated and my chain lubed. I don’t race or wear spandex. I just commute. The project of this blog is to demonstrate the richness that biking lends to (an otherwise unathletic) life, and the new perspectives it brings to the urban experience. Every day on my bike, I encounter little visual haikus, tantalizing hints of narrative, and moments of community with strangers, all while getting where I need to go, lowering my resting heart rate, and taking a tiny little nibble out of global warming.
To paraphrase the war on drugs: This is your city…This is your city on a bike.
on November 23, 2007 on 4:33 pm
Hello,
I don’t think I even know your name, but I happened on your blog while doing internet research for a little article I’m writing on the Women Making History in Portland mural for the newspaper Just Out (www.justout.com). There are a couple quotes I found so great I’d like to use them in my piece, if that’s all right with you.
The specific quotes are:
“The older I get, and the more I encounter the kind of masculine disregard, condescension, and sexual harrassment that I used to think was a thing of the past, the more I connect with the idea of feminist solidarity.”
and
“One of the many great things about Portland is the way that it responds to pain and fear with art.”
If this is cool with you, perhaps just email me your full name as you’d like it to appear in print and maybe a phrase or sentence on how I might describe you in the piece. (Even if it’s just “local cyclist and blogger…”)
Thanks!
Tony
anthonyletigre@gmail.com