Wheels of fortune

 It says so in the Bible (sort of):

“When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became [a really old woman], I put away childish things.”

And so it has come to pass. When I moved to the Upper West Side four years ago to an apartment just steps from the bike path, I bought a fire-engine-red bike, and I started pedaling like a 10-year-old. Riding my bike was an unexpected late-life pleasure that gave me intimate views of my new neighborhood and beyond. It gave me access to places I couldn’t reach by other means, like the little red lighthouse and the great gray bridge of storybook fame:

“Once upon a time a little lighthouse was built on a sharp point of the shore by the Hudson River. It was round and fat and red. It was fat and red and jolly. And it was VERY, VERY PROUD. [Then a great gray bridge was built, dwarfing the little red lighthouse and causing a crisis of confidence. But all’s well that ends well.] Beside the towering gray bridge the lighthouse still bravely stands. Though it knows now that it is little, it is still VERY, VERY PROUD. And every day the people who go up Riverside Drive in New York City turn to look at it. For there they both are—the great gray bridge and the little red lighthouse.”

During the worst of COVID, when the subway seemed to many of us a nest of germs, I could wend my way to the Battery, on the southern tip of Manhattan. I could circle Central Park in endless loops. Once I even wheeled myself to Crown Heights and back—nearly 30 miles round trip, not bad for a 70-year-old!

But a few weeks ago, at the age of 71, I finally put away that childish thing. My arthritic neck, my hands gnarled by Dupuytrens contracture, and my flickering attention (Is that a barred owl?) made it dangerous for me to continue riding. Every biker I know has had an accident. One friend was widowed when her husband was clipped by a bus. Another friend was blown off her bike by the downdraft from a helicopter landing at the West 30th Street heliport. Another lost control when she took a hand off the handlebars to brush her hair out of her eyes; she fell and broke her collar bone. Another … but that’s enough.

A few weeks ago, I woke up one morning and had a flash of good judgment. I needed to stop riding. To make sure I didn’t lapse in my resolve, I emailed my yoga teacher, offering my favorite toy to her 20-something daughter. And she accepted. I just hope I haven’t dodged a curse only to pass it on.





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