Middle of the Road, Sort Of

After taking the Road I class, I had resolutely been cycling smack in the center of any lane that is not definitely wide enough for a car and bike side by side with three feet of space between them, and then had a couple of experiences of being honked at and chickening out, or, worse, of chickening out even before the person honked.

After each incident, I spent several hours, off and on, mentally lecturing the driver: “Why am I in the middle of the road? You mean, besides the fact that I’m legally entitled to be, besides the fact that I pay taxes to use this road just like you do, and besides the fact that any bicycle safety class in the country would tell me to do exactly what I’m doing?”

This is an attempt at control: If I can make my case strongly enough (in my head), everything will go my way.

But of course what drivers do is beyond my control. Whether I’m on the right, on the left, or in my apartment having a little snack, they will do whatever they do, and I will have some good experiences and some bad experiences. Most drivers will be respectful, some are alarmingly self-entitled, and a tiny minority are murderous sociopaths.

Why can’t everyone be relaxed and considerate all the time? Why can’t all drivers exercise self-restraint? I suppose for the same reasons I can’t stop myself from delivering mental lectures or doing other things that aren’t constructive: Force of habit, bolstered, in the case of mental lecturing, by self-righteousness. But I wouldn’t say all this silent argument makes me happy, and I’m sure the driver who honks belligerently doesn’t feel happy, either.

I revisited the subject with David on the phone and found out he does not necessarily advocate planting oneself in the middle of the lane and staying there no matter what, but rather being more to the right when reasonable, but taking the lane decisively when it is a matter of safety.

For instance, once when I was going straight on Market St., a woman in a car to my left turned right and cut me off, nearly hitting me; fortunately, she wasn’t going fast. In the ensuing discussion, she claimed it was my fault—that I had veered into her! She called me a “cracker” for good measure.

David says he takes the whole lane in that particular spot to prevent that exact thing. If I’d been in front of or behind the woman, she couldn’t have affected me with a turn to either direction.

Two Saturdays ago, I went to Rainbow, and then to see Gone Baby Gone. The plot twists baffled me, but I enjoyed its grim tone, and thought Casey Affleck’s performance in a lead role was wonderful.

I spent the rest of the day cooking and listening to my two favorite new CDs: Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black, and Macy Gray’s Big. I made brown rice, yellow-eye beans, squash soup, a vat of tomato sauce, and peanut butter cookies—someone had eaten all of the previous week’s batch and, trying to thaw frozen cookies in a rush, had gone so far as to burn five of them in the microwave, creating quite an unpleasant stench.

On Sunday, I thought I should balance Saturday’s dark movie with something more uplifting, and so saw Dan in Real Life, which I regretted. I don’t think there was one genuinely amusing moment, though I liked the teenage boy character saying “Love isn’t a feeling, it’s an ability.”

Leaving the theater afterwards, I ran into Tom’s niece, Sarah, and her boyfriend, Josh. It was such a nice day, I walked all the way home, which took about an hour. I stopped to try a new restaurant, Mi Lindo Yucatan, at the corner of 15^th and Valencia. I can’t say what I had, because Mily is reading, but it came in a vivid red-orange-pink broth that was very pleasing.

Since then, I have joined PETA and received my first periodical full of pictures of suffering and dead animals, including a chicken that had been boiled alive, so I think it’s safe to say I won’t be eating meat, fowl or fish for a time, though I don’t think I can give up eggs and butter right now.

A couple of blocks beyond Mi Lindo Yucatan, I stopped at the Bombay Creamery to get a pint of green tea ice cream.

Later I took the bus to Eugene Cash’s Sunday night Buddhist meditation group. Usually I’m still cooking on Sunday evenings, but I would like to make a couple of new friends, or at least spend time with a congenial bunch of people, and Eugene’s group is a large gathering of like-minded souls. Last time I went, I noticed a lingering good effect, so I am going to make it a point to get there.

He puts a big emphasis on community, and members of his sangha do volunteer projects together and meet in small groups to pursue particular interests, such as book study.