Greatest American Hero

Tomorrow I will mount the bicycle for the first trip of the week into work by human power. Both Monday and Tuesday I drove, both because I woke up so late as to miss the bus and to pick up a lighting device after work, something that isn't possible on a bicycle.

One reason why bicycle commuting will forever be a third-tier transportation medium -- you can really only transport yourself on one, nothing else.

Sure, on occasion my panniers are filled with produce from the CSA or other such wares but in reality it's obviously impossible to fill up your propane tank, to bring home a lawnmower from the service shop or to shop at Sears on a bicycle. Nowhere to attach a 20# tank to your bike, can't drag a lawnmower behind you, and Sears demands patrons drive as they don't have a single bike rack near any of their three entrances. The bicycle as a mode of transportation is really just a wealthy-white-boy concept here in America -- immigrants don't ride bikes, poor people don't commute on bikes, and women most certainly don't commute by bikes.

At least, Elk Grovian women don't. Never seen one in nearly twenty years of bicycle commuting. A fair number of Sacramentan women ride, yes, but they live in areas that are expensive and are near valid destinations. They reek of wealth. Bicycling is more a recreational function than a true mobility function for them.

No middle class Elk Grovian woman would be caught dead commuting by bicycle. Not caught dead. They are far too deserving and privileged to ride a bike, and if she's an immigrant woman, whoa! there's no way she'll be caught dead riding a bike. She immigrated for the precise reason not to ever have to pedal around under her own power again. I say it once more -- she didn't immigrate to America to ride a fucking bike.

Elk Grovians didn't move to Elk Grove to ride bikes, either. The median income prohibits it. Bicycling as a viable mode is really only for those with 2+ DUIs and those who can't afford the reasonable registration/insurance costs on a vehicular unit or two, and these types of people generally don't inhabit Elk Grove...at least not yet. Nonetheless, Elk Grove is slowing becoming such a "community," where $3.85 gas begins to interfere with our God Given Right to Perpetual Motoring. Some of us gasp! are actually beginning to use the e-tran bus services! Some are limiting their recreation use of motoring. This is a slap in the face to the energy intensive lifestyles of extreme suburban commuting that we've become entitled accustomed to.

This is a mad, mad world! $3.85 gas! Oh, shimmering future, where are you! Aren't our best days supposed to be ahead of us? Aren't we entitled to perpetually cheap energy?

I drove to work today as there was no other option available to me for the sin of having slept in an extra hour. I fought with traffic the entire way, while it was not lost on me that I was traffic, that if I weren't there driving to work, traffic would have been incrementally reduced. I took advantage of the drive and completed two errands that I couldn't do by bicycle, such as picking up that light. I merged the two activities of consumption and commuting, and for that I should be recognized as the Greatest American Hero, reducing my carbon footprint by combining trips and enabling our economy..you know, the one based on 70% consumption.

Yep. I am the Greatest American Hero. I drove. I consumed. I feigned environmental consciousness. I did everything I could do to support our American ideas. I am but a humble Hero, yes...