The Davis Enterprise: Dec. 8, 2008

Davis Bicycles! column #004

Title: Bicycle commute is a total pleasure
Author: Matt Biers-Ariel

I live in Davis and teach at Winters High School. That's about 4,500 commute miles a year, and 4,200 of those miles are by bicycle.

Commuting by bike is one of the great pleasures in life. For a glorious hour and a half, I am unplugged from computers and cell phones but plugged into the nature's rhythms. Sometimes I think of lesson plans; sometimes I obsess over a difficult interaction with a student. But mostly I watch the world.

I've never missed the first robins of spring or the pungent almond blossoms bursting open. The rare bluebird rocketing across Putah Creek Road is nothing less than soul food. For a good part of winter, the morning commute is pitch-black except for my headlight and the stars. At 6:30 a.m. the country roads are empty, and I often turn off the light. It's a slice of the sublime to bike under Orion's watchful gaze.

The commute is not always bliss. Sometimes I have the wrong gloves, and the cold burns so hard that it's a scream fest all the way to work. Sometimes it's rain of biblical proportions or fog as thick as a Frappuccino — only colder. But the times I don't ride, all day long I'm anxious that something isn't right, like when you brush your teeth but forget to floss.

Like all my friends, colleagues and students, I live a frenetic life. The only thing bigger than my "to do" list is the pile of ungraded essays. I rush to finish one thing in order to rush to the next. But by its nature, the pace of life changes when you are traveling at 17 miles per hour versus 60.

In "Fahrenheit 451," Ray Bradbury observes that people are always in a hurry, that they have no time to enjoy anything. My students always nod when we read this passage. When they learn that the book was published in 1953, two generations before text-messaging and 30 years before phone answering machines, their jaws drop, for they know that life moves exponentially faster today and just keeps gaining speed.

Cycling is a built-in daily workout. There's no need to join a gym. Its carbon footprint is minuscule; and it's the cheapest form of commuting outside of hoofing it to work. Currently, the IRS figures that a mile of driving costs 50.5 cents. Rather than annually spending $2,200 commuting by car, a bicycle commute costs less than $200.

Using a ton or two of car to carry a person and a few papers on a 25-mile round trip makes as much sense as using a clothes dryer instead of a clothesline on a summer day when the ambient temperature is above 90 degrees. Sure, I can use the dryer, and sure, I can drive the car, but given the state of the atmosphere and the thickness of my wallet, better options exist.

My students are always fascinated by the bike. I suppose that if someone were to take a poll five years after graduation and ask students what they remembered from Mr. Biers-Ariel's class, some might say, "He showed us the dirty jokes in Romeo and Juliet," others, "He always yelled about those stupid commas," but I bet there would be a larger contingent who would answer, "That dude rode his bike from Davis."

And if that were the case, I wouldn't be sad.

— Matt Biers-Ariel lives in Davis with his family and teaches English at Winters High School.