{"id":180079757,"date":"2010-09-16T06:09:17","date_gmt":"2010-09-16T06:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=180079757"},"modified":"2010-09-16T06:09:17","modified_gmt":"2010-09-16T06:09:17","slug":"i-want-to-ride-my-bicycle-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=180079757","title":{"rendered":"I Want to Ride My Bicycle\u2026!"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Miranda Hitchcock
\nI am, admittedly, not a big fan of \u201cexercise.\u201d I don\u2019t like going to the gym, and get bored easily on equipment like elliptical machines. After awful shin splints and stress fractures in high school track I can\u2019t run, and most of my fitness plans begin with the word, \u201ctomorrow.\u201d But recently I had an epiphany: my housemate has a bicycle. My office is close by. Parking is expensive.
\nAnd voila! Suddenly I\u2019m a bicycle commuter, riding a bike to work every day that I can. This is good exercise (although the ride is short) but somehow it escapes the negative feeling I usually get with that word. My ride has a purpose and a destination- it takes me to and from my office, and I feel a sense of achievement with each ride that I never got on a stationary bike where you end, literally, where you start. My riding saves me money, since I don\u2019t have to fill a meter with quarters (up to $8\/day even without the expensive, likely parking tickets in Bethesda). Riding to work brings a feeling of \u201cgoodness\u201d and \u201cgreenness,\u201d since I\u2019m not contributing to the belching of pollution and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere from cars.
\nI get the exhilaration of passing cars as they wait in traffic while I zip by along the sidewalks. As these mornings get a little cooler I get the refreshing wake-up call of the wind to get me ready for work without the coffee and the caffeine. More than anything, I get a few minutes of sanity-improving un-connectedness. A product of my generation, I spend most of my time connected to technology. I\u2019m listening to my iPod, playing on my smartphone, watching TV, surfing the internet\u2026 all day, most days. But for the time I spend biking to and from work I have only the physical world around me, and I\u2019m convinced that these few minutes greatly improve my mood and my ability to remain sane throughout a busy workday. All of these factors sum up an important point about sustainability that people often miss- it\u2019s about more than just the environment! Sustainability is about treating our environment well so that it can continue to provide for us in the future. It\u2019s also about treating our bodies and our minds (and our bank accounts!) so that they can provide for us in the future. So while riding a bike to work may not \u201csave the earth,\u201d it has sustainable benefits in many aspects of life.
\nI don\u2019t know that I will ever take up biking as \u201cexercise,\u201d but I\u2019m certainly glad that I have the ability to bike to work. It\u2019s good for the environment, good for my bank account, good for my health, and good for my mental well-being. That\u2019s a lot of \u201cgood!\u201d So until it gets too cold and dreary to ride (and let\u2019s face it, I like \u201ccold and dreary\u201d even less than \u201cexercise\u201d), you\u2019ll see me relatively-slowly but happily bicycling to work. Maybe sometime I\u2019ll catch you doing the same!
\nMiranda Hitchcock is the Implementation Manager for the Maryland Energy & Sustainability Co-op.
\n
\nhttps:\/\/nrgcoop.wordpress.com\/2010\/09\/15\/i-want-to-ride-my-bicycle\/<\/a>oldId.20100916060917259<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Miranda Hitchcock I am, admittedly, not a big fan of \u201cexercise.\u201d I don\u2019t like going to the gym, and get bored easily on equipment like elliptical machines. After awful shin splints and stress fractures in high school track I can\u2019t run, and most of my fitness plans begin with the word, \u201ctomorrow.\u201d But recently … <\/p>\n

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