Why I Divorced My First Husband
Sep. 5th, 2023 08:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mallorys_cameraSpent all night talking e-bikes with the Galactic Expert on e-bikes. (This was in my dreams.)
“What I’m really worried about,” I told the Galactic Expert, “is taking turns on an e-bike. I slow down for turns. But what if the bike’s sensors register that I’m slowing down and kick in? Then I’ll speed up! And fall off the bike.”
###
I dreamed about e-bikes because I spent around three hours yesterday reading about e-bikes and looking at e-bikes online.
This one was my favorite:
Back in the day, I was a total bicycle nut.
Used to do centuries and relays and crits.
Bonded with my first husband over our mutual love of cycling.
And actually divorced him over a really irritating cycling habit.
Bill was a much stronger cyclist than I was, so when we were powering up a steep hill, he would get to the top more quickly than I did—and then, he would turn around, ride back down to where I was, and begin circling me. Round and round and round! Like some kind of vulture!
UGH!
You would have divorced him, too.
###
Here I am on my very first visit to the UK a billion years ago:
I was—what? Maybe 21?
Which would make this 1973.
I’d used a couple of thousand dollars from my modeling money to organize a cycling trip through Dorset and the Cotswolds and Bath and all the other places in the 19th century British novels I loved so much. That love had sustained me through a difficult adolescence.
And here I am, maybe 14 years later, with X-husband Bill (to my right) and our friend Marco.
We’d just done some kind of race that involved cycling from Berkeley to Sausalito.
###
I was an avid cyclist riding at least 20 miles a day right up to the time I left Ithaca.
But I couldn’t figure out a way to bring my bike south when I left—I distrust back-of-the-car bike carriers.
And now I live on a twisty, windy country road that’s a shortcut between Route 9 and Route 9G, so cars race up and down it at 50 mph. I’m afraid of being hit by one of them.
So, I haven’t been on a bike for 11 years.
An e-bike wouldn’t lessen the chances of being hit by a car, of course.
But it would compensate to some degree for how out of shape I’ve become.
I could always throw the e-bike in the back of a car, drive to Barrytown, and ride it there. Or go into therapy and overcome my Fear of Back-of-the-Car Carriers.
###
Not much else to report. I Remunerated yesterday but not as much as I had hoped, so it seems unlikely I will finish the Current Remunerative Project today.
A girl can dream, though…
Also, when I finished for the day yesterday and went outside to tromp, I found that while it wasn’t all that hot, it was horribly humid: The air was muck.
So, I didn’t tromp and felt like a Baaaad Dog.
The humidity is still astronomically high—92% sez the hygrometer. (Can that be accurate?). But the temps are still low.
So even though it throws my rhythm completely off, I’m going off tromping now.
“What I’m really worried about,” I told the Galactic Expert, “is taking turns on an e-bike. I slow down for turns. But what if the bike’s sensors register that I’m slowing down and kick in? Then I’ll speed up! And fall off the bike.”
###
I dreamed about e-bikes because I spent around three hours yesterday reading about e-bikes and looking at e-bikes online.
This one was my favorite:
Back in the day, I was a total bicycle nut.
Used to do centuries and relays and crits.
Bonded with my first husband over our mutual love of cycling.
And actually divorced him over a really irritating cycling habit.
Bill was a much stronger cyclist than I was, so when we were powering up a steep hill, he would get to the top more quickly than I did—and then, he would turn around, ride back down to where I was, and begin circling me. Round and round and round! Like some kind of vulture!
UGH!
You would have divorced him, too.
###
Here I am on my very first visit to the UK a billion years ago:
I was—what? Maybe 21?
Which would make this 1973.
I’d used a couple of thousand dollars from my modeling money to organize a cycling trip through Dorset and the Cotswolds and Bath and all the other places in the 19th century British novels I loved so much. That love had sustained me through a difficult adolescence.
And here I am, maybe 14 years later, with X-husband Bill (to my right) and our friend Marco.
We’d just done some kind of race that involved cycling from Berkeley to Sausalito.
###
I was an avid cyclist riding at least 20 miles a day right up to the time I left Ithaca.
But I couldn’t figure out a way to bring my bike south when I left—I distrust back-of-the-car bike carriers.
And now I live on a twisty, windy country road that’s a shortcut between Route 9 and Route 9G, so cars race up and down it at 50 mph. I’m afraid of being hit by one of them.
So, I haven’t been on a bike for 11 years.
An e-bike wouldn’t lessen the chances of being hit by a car, of course.
But it would compensate to some degree for how out of shape I’ve become.
I could always throw the e-bike in the back of a car, drive to Barrytown, and ride it there. Or go into therapy and overcome my Fear of Back-of-the-Car Carriers.
###
Not much else to report. I Remunerated yesterday but not as much as I had hoped, so it seems unlikely I will finish the Current Remunerative Project today.
A girl can dream, though…
Also, when I finished for the day yesterday and went outside to tromp, I found that while it wasn’t all that hot, it was horribly humid: The air was muck.
So, I didn’t tromp and felt like a Baaaad Dog.
The humidity is still astronomically high—92% sez the hygrometer. (Can that be accurate?). But the temps are still low.
So even though it throws my rhythm completely off, I’m going off tromping now.
