So... it's been suggested that doing some writing would be good for me, and it's hard for me to argue. And really, at least in my own head, there's been a lot going on, so maybe I'll give this thingy-thing another try. Baby steps...
This morning I wimped out of riding, spooked by the forecasts of mixed snow and rain and 50 kt winds. Which failed to materialize. Tons of rain did materialize, though, and since I had to run into town to buy blackworms for the electric fish, I wasn't entirely sorry to have taken a car. But, when L.J. and E.G. showed up for beans-rice-and-science lunch on their bikes, I felt a little soft.
Before this latest storm rolled in, though, it's been beautiful here in PDX. The last storm dumped a ton of snow on Mt. Hood, and the shoulders are pure white as the mountain rises above the fringe of conifers on the horizon. I really am so happy to back in the Northwest. The picture above was taken on my Friday ride in to work. I'm at the top of the Riverside Cemetery, just before dropping down to the Willamette and crossing the Sellwood bridge to work. It's a pretty great ride, and it trade the terrifying lack-of-shoulder of Hwy 43 for these deserted roads in the Cemetery and the bike path ringing Tryon Creek State Park.
I've always been in favor of commuting by bike. I'm an ecologist, and I know too much about the impacts of driving to pretend a blissful ignorance of the impacts of my car. And early in my married life, I found that the increase in commute time that accompanied my ride really helped me make a transition from lab to home. Driving just put me home too fast, and I was still thinking about whatever bits of work I'd been wresting with- physically home, but mentally in lab. Biking home gave me time to let go of work, plus gave me some excercise, so by the time I walk in the door, I was happy, and happy to be home. Now that I'm a dad, and a postdoc, it's a bit more complicated. Both are more than fulltime jobs, and I'm not sure I'm doing either well. It's increasingly hard to justify to extra 1.5-2 hrs a day riding, when I feel like I'm leaving everywhere undone. My only consolation is that maybe the riding is preventing me from doing an even worse job... The exercise does mellow me out, and it is slowly eroding the dissertation-belly, and 20 years from now, I imagine I'll appreciate the working heart.
