You never forget how to ride a bicycle

However, you can get really bad at it.

Yesterday I went for a walk, as I often do on a Saturday, up to the Dunbar shopping area. It's a good 30-minute walk from home, and I love talking the residential route up from 16th rather than walking straight up Dunbar. I was heading for Dunbar Cycles.

Saturday morning I jumped in my car intending to take a serious look at some bicycles. I own an old mountain bike, but I was pretty sure that I would ride more if I could get a new one, especially one that was lighter and easier to hoist into the back of my car. My plan was to check out the cheaper bike purveyors, like Canadian Tire, Sport Chek, etc., as I knew I didn't want to invest $2000 in something I wasn't sure I would ride. But the traffic yesterday was insane! Driving East-West in Vancouver is problematic anyway, but yesterday it was bumper-to-bumper all along 12th Avenue, Broadway, and, finally, 4th Avenue. (The irony of being stuck in traffic going to buy a bicycle, when I would not have been stuck had I been riding one, was not lost on me!) Anyway, I gave up and went home (although I did stop at Carter Honda to check out the motorcycle stock, and found a demo 750 Aero on sale....).

Needing exercise and preferring to walk with a purpose, I decided to walk to Dunbar Cycles. I really was going just to look (I had dropped in on the local 10th Avenue bike shop in the morning, but they had only one bike under $700 and most were in the $1500 and up range) but I also knew that I had thought about it for long enough and might, indeed, make a purchase.

I had help from a very nice man who explained that I needed the 'extra-small' size of frame, which they proceeded to whip out of a box and assemble just so I could try it. Well, I fell in love with it immediately. It has adjustable everything, with the flick of a lever - no need to carry tools - and the gears sure have improved since I last bought a bike, some 15 years ago! I got a Fort-Knox-type lock, and proceeded to ride home.

It's a good thing there are quiet streets between Dunbar and home, is all I can say. I wobbled. I braked. I took the corners as if I were riding on ice, and at the stop sign, damn near fell off. I have been riding my motorcycle a lot lately, and when you come to a stop, you put your feet down to balance the bike. Well, I automatically did that on the bicycle, only to discover that, unlike on the motorcycle, my feet come nowhere near the ground....Luckily, I somehow managed to slide off the seat and plant my feet before I toppled over, but it was a near thing. And of course I wasn't wearing a helmet, so I was feeling vulnerable anyway.

So I have a new bike, and today, while the weather holds, I am going for a ride with JR. I need practice, that's for sure, and he has been saying he would like to get back into riding his bike, so I am INTEGRATING cycling into my life and, hopefully, his.

LATER...Mission accomplished: a 30-minute loop out to UBC on the 16th Avenue bike path, and then back on the University Blvd bike lane. The only real disadvantage I felt was the lack of wing mirrors to see over-taking traffic - something we take for granted on motorcycles. Aside from that, I came back in love with riding my new bike. There are 24 gears - 3 large sprockets and 8 small - and shifting them is smooth and easy - nothing like what I remember from previous bikes. I sailed along, changing up and down as the resistance hit me, thoroughly enjoying myself.

The lack of cycling skills did get me thinking about the whole 'use it or lose it' thing. How many things do we learn in our lives, and then forget? What do we retain, and why? They say you never forget how to ride a bicycle, and that is true. But I found I had forgotten how to watch for traffic, how to stop gracefully, and how to corner smoothly. I had forgotten, as well, the exhilaration of the downhill ride!

What other things have I lost that I used to do with an unconscious grace, and now remember only the basic physical actions? Whistling is one: I can put my lips together and produce a sound, but I can't whistle 'Surrey with the Fringe on Top' the way I could when I was 7....Also, when my grandchildren were born, I noticed with each of them that while I knew how to cradle their heads and keep them secure, I had lost the naturalness of holding them - something that once was the entire focus of my life, with the baby who became their father.

As an educator, I find the whole area of learning retention fascinating, and am constantly finding examples, in my life and the lives of others, about how important that 'use it or lose it' adage is.