Bike Snob Read online

Just as there’s no more Pettitt’s Hotel, there’s also no canal, nor is there a Canal Street. However, if you keep going on Jamaica Avenue you run right into Merrick Road. (If you pass the Save-A-Thon you’ve gone too far.) Actually, now it’s called “Merrick Boulevard” in these parts, but it’s the same road. This was it—the cycling thoroughfare of the late nineteenth century! It was our Yellow Brick Road; our Appian Way; our Great Silk Route; maybe even our Via Dolorosa! It seemed to me that there should be some kind of statue somewhere, or at least a plaque. Instead, there were just a whole lot of perplexed pedestrians wondering why I was staring at a street sign outside of a sneaker shop. Sighing, I remounted and made a right on Merrick Road, and headed east.

  Keep on the Merrick Road. The rippling streams passed are more refreshing to the eye and cooling to the senses than the swamps of Rockaway Avenue.

  I heeded the article’s advice, since I do hate swamps and didn’t savor the idea of getting mauled by one of Jamaica’s many alligators. However, unless you count rivulets of dog urine, there were no streams on or near Merrick Road, rippling or otherwise. There also weren’t any cyclists, apart from the odd delivery person riding a department store bike on the sidewalk. There were, however, many used car lots, as well as an abundance of fast-food chicken restaurants.

  Still, despite the urban sprawl, it wasn’t impossible to imagine a time when this was a country road teeming with cyclists. While more or less straight, Merrick Boulevard isn’t dead straight, like newer roads. Instead, it follows the mild grade and contour of the land like an older road does. And as any cyclist knows, the difference between a plumb-straight road and an “organic” one is huge. It’s the difference between a pleasant ride and a mind-numbing one. Also, while the environs were far from pretty, there was still just enough room on the road to ride with traffic. I’ve certainly ridden nicer roads, but it was vastly better than Main Street in Flushing. Take away all the KFCs and traffic lights and you can picture a country road with cyclists waving to each other as they pass. Finally, I was plugged into the circuitry of history, and I was beginning to enjoy myself.

  Follow the Merrick Road to Valley Stream and Pearsalls.

  As I left Queens and crossed into Nassau County and Valley Stream, the road surface improved noticeably, and the used car lots gave way to new car dealerships. Also, Merrick Boulevard became West Merrick Road. The difference wasn’t exactly dramatic; it was more like the way you feel when you return to your hotel room after the bed’s been made and the bathroom’s been cleaned. But while tidier than eastern Queens, Valley Stream felt no less busy. There was also no giant rotating penny-farthing statue in the middle of a fountain illuminated by multicolored lights as I had secretly hoped.

  If I’d been going strictly by the Times article I probably would have gotten lost, since Pearsalls became Lynbrook in the early 1900s when the residents cleverly (or lamely) transposed the syllables of nearby Brooklyn, from whence many of them hailed. (It’s a good thing they weren’t all from Canarsie, or else the town might have been called something like “Arse Can.”) Had I not known this I would have charged right through Lynbrook, dismissing it simply as an enclave of confused and dyslexic Brooklynites. Furthermore, there’s certainly no “general store” in Lynbrook (unless you count Green Acres Mall), nor does it resemble a country town in any way, which makes this next direction seem thoroughly ridiculous:

  At this town, turn to the right upon reaching the typical general store of a country town. Mistake is not possible…

  Mistake most certainly is possible. A more accurate direction would be “turn right upon reaching the White Castle.” In any case, though, it didn’t turn out to be a problem. I happen to know the intersection well, it also being the location of the movie theater in which I saw the Weird Al movie UHF in 1989 (highly recommended—a “Weird Al” Yankovic tour de force, and no, that is not an oxymoron).

  Ride on through Fenhurst, Woodsburg, and Lawrence direct to Far Rockaway.

  “Fenhurst” is actually the present-day town of Hewlett, Woodsburg is the old part of the modern-day town of Woodmere, and Lawrence is still Lawrence. There are also two other nearby towns called Cedarhurst and Inwood, and the whole area is collectively known as the “Five Towns.”

  Making the right onto Broadway and entering the Five Towns, I saw something I hadn’t seen since Kew Gardens—a street sign with a picture of a bicycle. Beneath that bicycle were the words “Bike Route.” Finally, here was some indication that roads that had been traveled heavily by cyclists over a hundred years ago were still being used by them today—or at least being used by me. The only other cyclists I actually saw were riding BMX bikes on the sidewalk across the street from the Lynbrook post office and grinding a concrete ledge with their axle pegs.

  After a brief stop in a coffee shop during which a customer told me I looked like I was going skiing despite my utter lack of skis, ski equipment, or ski attire, I continued down Broadway. The sights grew increasingly familiar, but until this day I’d never had any idea that at one time this street was teeming with the very first cyclists. It was eerie. I mean, besides the fact that there’s a bike shop on Broadway in Woodmere where I used to smudge the glass case with my nose while gazing lovingly at Hutch stems I couldn’t afford, there’s absolutely no sign of its cycling history. There are plenty of other places today that maintain their cycling heritage, but the Rockaway peninsula is not one of them. Yet I’d become a cyclist anyway. In growing up here, had I absorbed it unknowingly? Had I somehow been informed by these mustachioed, pantalooned ghosts?

  As you travel through the Five Towns the streets grow quieter and leafier, and the houses are more rambling. Of all the neighborhoods through which you pass on the 1895 Rockaway Run, the Five Towns are the ones in which it’s easiest to imagine what things might have been like back then. And if the City of Greater New York had not been created in 1898 and the city line had not arbitrarily been dropped between Far Rockaway and Lawrence like a gigantic page break in the MS Word document that is Long Island, this feeling would continue right through to my final destination, which was Far Rockaway:

  Here ample hotel accommodation is offered, and a good dinner to be had. The attractions of the place are well known. Surf or quiet water bathing can be enjoyed at the option of the rider.

  Yes, back then Far Rockaway was the place to be:

  FAR ROCKAWAY’S BREEZES.

  Never a Dull Day or Evening at This Popular Resort

  Far Rockaway, L.I. July 21.—For cool breezes, pretty girls, and general attractions this place stands in the front rank of Long Island resorts. Never a dull day and never a dull evening is the record at Far Rockaway. Social affairs come around with clock-like regularity, and one follows so close upon the other that the Summer visitors have barely time to catch their breath after one social round before the hour for another one is at hand. Life at the hotels and boarding houses is everything that could be desired during the heated term. Surf and still-water bathing, driving, and pleasant gatherings on the broad verandas are popular forms of recreation…

  Once it became the eastern extremity of New York City and politically separate from the town of Hempstead, Far Rockaway slowly began to wither. There are no hotel accommodations anymore, and “good dinner” is relative. The last article I read in the New York Times about Far Rockaway was from January 27, 2008, and the headline was “Beaten Down, and Not Only by Nature.” It’s still beautiful, though. My ride was over, and I’d wound up right where I started.

  The Beginning of the End of the Beginning

  Cycling’s first boom began to subside once automobiles improved and became more affordable. In 1909, police were setting speed traps on Merrick Road for “scorchers” in automobiles. For a while, the bicycle was just a quaint relic, and instead of reporting the “Gossip of the Cyclers” the New York Times was reporting on cycling’s death, which they attributed to the fact that it “always involved more or less hard work, more or less of the discomforts of the road, a
nd always the limitation of the rider.” Not only that, but unlike the car the bicycle “did not admit of discrimination whereby the love of display, the superiority purchasable by money, or the essential comfort of the individual could be expressed.” In other words, too much work, not enough flash.

  Of course, this turned out to be totally wrong. Cycling’s popularity might have waned temporarily while the world got acquainted with the automobile, but it hardly died. This is precisely because, as the writer also pointed out, it is “a wonder of convenience” and “healthy outdoor exercise.” And the fact that it involves “hard work” and “the limitation of the rider” proved to be advantages and not disadvantages, because hard work makes you stronger and learning your limitations allows you to overcome them. And best of all, it certainly is much harder to indulge “the love of display, the superiority purchasable by money” with a bicycle than it is with a car. That’s a good thing. Anything based on “the love of display” is fleeting. And can anyone honestly say that roads full of expensive automobiles with over-powered stereos and over-polished rims make the world a more beautiful place?

  The very things that supposedly ended the first cycling boom are actually the reasons cycling’s not only still with us, but is currently more popular than it has been in a long, long time. I may not have seen any cyclists on the Rockaway Run, but that’s only because they were “running” elsewhere on different roads. Just like the riders in 1895 sought macadam, cyclists today still seek the best and most pleasant roads. They’re just farther out in the country. Everything about riding a bicycle compels you towards beauty. Moreover, while the automobile might have urbanized and suburbanized bucolic Long Island, in downtown Manhattan more and more people are riding. In New York and elsewhere in the country, cyclists are at home both on the periphery of the city and in the heart. The activity is simultaneously urban and pastoral, and both aspects of it are increasingly coming together today.

  It’s tempting to look at Rockaway’s change from an upscale resort to an urban enclave and Merrick Road’s transition from a cycling paradise to an automotive thoroughfare as a “decline.” But it’s just change, and change is good. The rarified world of luxury and leisure inevitably yields to practicality and accessibility. And that’s where cycling is now. What started out as an indoor amusement for society folk has become increasingly democratized and more and more accessible. Merrick Road is not a great place to ride anymore, but the spirit of the Merrick Road is everywhere, and if you ride a bike you’re guaranteed to find it, both on the roads and in yourself.

  WHAT IS A CYCLIST, AND WHY WOULD ANYBODY WANT TO BE ONE?

  My father is the Hollywood equivalent of a clean, fillet-brazed frame. My brother is like one of those fat-tubed aluminum Cannondales. I’m more like one of those Taiwanese Masis.

  —Emilio Estevez

  Defining the Cyclist

  Today, regardless of where you live, bicycles are everywhere. In fact, they’re so common you probably don’t even notice them most of the time. They’re chained to poles on city sidewalks, hanging from walls in suburban garages, strapped to the backs of RVs plying the interstate, and even for sale at discount prices alongside the thirty-pound bags of Cheetos at Wal-Mart. And sometimes you even see people riding them. The bicycle ranks right up there with the automobile, the sneaker, and the guitar as a ubiquitous cultural symbol. It’s one of those things that’s part of all of our lives at one time or another. Who doesn’t remember their first ride without training wheels? Your bicycle is the first vehicle you operate completely on your own, and it occasions the first time in your life you lay out your own route and choose your own destination. There’s hardly anybody who hasn’t owned or at least ridden a bicycle at some point in his or her life. I mean, sure, you do come across people occasionally who never learned how to ride a bike, but it’s rare and a little unsettling. It’s like meeting Someone who can’t operate a washing machine, or a thirty-two-year-old guy who never learned how to pee standing up. You smile politely, you pity them silently, and then you move on down to the other end of the bar.

  Despite the ubiquity of the bicycle, though, it’s difficult to define a cyclist. Obviously you have to ride a bike to be a cyclist, yet the truth is there are plenty of people who ride bikes but aren’t cyclists. Take the food delivery person, for example. While this person may spend as much time on a bicycle as the most dedicated pro rider, many food delivery people aren’t cyclists. They’re simply people who must use a bicycle in the course of their workday. If the restaurant provided them with a motor scooter, or a car, or a shopping cart propelled by dachshunds, they’d just as happily use any one of those instead. Certainly this is not to say that there aren’t food delivery people who do like to ride bicycles, or that there aren’t cyclists among them, but often they’re as much cyclists as the average person who uses a computer at work is a tech geek, or the average physician is a stethoscope enthusiast. The bicycle is just a tool they use to do their job.

  The cyclist, however, does not use the bicycle only as a tool. The cyclist opts for the bicycle even when other means of transportation are available. If you’re a cyclist, you’ll actually ride a bicycle even when you don’t have to go anywhere at all. You might just get on your bike, pedal around for a while, and come right back home having gone nowhere and accomplished nothing. So given the fact that riding a bike is a prerequisite to being a cyclist, it would follow then that we can define a cyclist as a person who chooses to ride a bike even when he or she doesn’t have to do so, right? Perfect, there we have it:

  Cyclist (noun)—One who rides a bicycle, even when he or she doesn’t have to do so.

  Well, I’d like to leave it at that, but the truth is I’m a cyclist. I don’t do things the easy way, I don’t accept answers I haven’t figured out for myself, and I seek out climbs instead of circumventing them. The problem with the above definition is that it doesn’t account for the many people who ride bicycles even when they don’t have to, but do so chiefly because they have an affinity (or even an obsession) with the bicycle itself. While many cyclists love bikes, loving bikes doesn’t necessarily make you a cyclist. If you’re around bikes a lot there’s a good chance you’ve run across these people. For them, it’s not about the riding; it’s about the bike, and the riding part is simply their way of fondling their possession. They keep their bicycles clean all the time, they fear scratches like they’re herpes, and they don’t ever ride in the rain (or as they call it, “water herpes”) so their bikes won’t get dirty or rusty. They’re like the people who collect toys but don’t remove them from the package so as not to diminish their value, or who swish wine around in their mouths without swallowing it, or who never get around to having actual sex because they’re too into sniffing high-heeled shoes while dressed as Darth Vader. These are not cyclists, they’re bicycle fetishists.

  In light of this, I say that the definition of a cyclist needs a qualifier, and that it should be: (1) a person who rides a bicycle even when he or she doesn’t have to; (2) a person who values the act of riding a bicycle over the tools one needs in order to do it.

  I’m comfortable with this. According to this definition, a cyclist can be anyone from a guy on a hybrid wearing jean shorts and sneakers, to a roadie on a Cervelo wearing a full team kit, to a person on a recumbent wearing a pink rabbit suit and singing along to a loudspeaker blaring Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s “Takin’ Care of Business.” Moreover, it eliminates those for whom the bicycle is more important than the riding of the bicycle, as well as those who ride incidentally but would defect given the slightest opportunity (such as a job change, or winning a brand-new car on Wheel of Fortune, or perhaps most irresistibly, receiving a dachshund-drawn shopping cart). Most importantly, a cyclist is a person who has incorporated bicycles and cycling into his or her everyday life.

  So, Why Ride?

  As human beings we’re trapped. We’re trapped by our physical limitations, and our responsibilities, and our fears. Regardless of yo
ur lifestyle, the truth is you’re governed by something. Sure, you can ignore your boss or your teachers or even the police. You can remove yourself from the grid, cease to wear deodorant, build yourself a yurt, plant a field full of Salvia divinorum, and invite your equally smelly neighbors over for raging hallucinogenic yurt parties every single day. But while you can dance around in a psychedelic stupor to the strains of your neighbor playing Devendra Banhart songs on his homemade mandolin for the rest of your life, you’re still subject to physics, and the need to eat and breathe, and the looming inevitability of death.

  Because of this, we all seek respite from the pain of existence. And those of us who choose to remain plugged into the grid (like me—I feel a life without TV and indoor toilets is one not worth living) have various ways of doing so. Just a few socially acceptable escapes from the drudgery of life many of us indulge in include: reading books; watching movies and television; consuming intoxicants; investing ourselves emotionally and financially in sports teams; gluing rhinestones onto our denim vests while listening to Hall & Oates (I know I’m not the only one); and obsessing over the mundane details of celebrities’ lives.

  But there are also longer-lasting and more rewarding ways to transcend the pain of human existence. Things like books and art can be transcendent, but they can also be a distraction. Which is not to say that distraction is a bad thing. I consume a steady diet of entertainment like any sensible American, but it’s the rare movie or story or picture or song that can actually pass the time and be enjoyable and fulfill a spiritual need and teach you about life—not to mention get you across town and whip your ass into shape. Cyclists escape the pain and drudgery of being alive by doing something we love to do, but we can also integrate that thing neatly and practically into our everyday lives. I can use cycling to get to work. (I can even use cycling for work if I’m a delivery person, or a pro racer, or a pedicab driver or something.) I can use it to run errands. I can use it for fitness. I can use it for competition, and I can use it for recreation. Cycling can be as practical or as frivolous as you want it to be. It’s a way of life.