GASOLINE IS THE OPIATE OF THE MASSES

Really, we’re not. I know that when most people hear that I use a bike as my primary transportation, they think I have a few screws loose.

The first concern is always about safety. Then the weather. Then the natural inclination against effort that many people seem to have these days. It seems crazy to be wet, sweaty, and straining up hills when you could be dry, warm, and sipping a coffee with a book on the T, or zoning out to music in your car.

But the honest truth is that now that I’ve done this for a few years, it seems a little crazy that any young, able-bodied person would do it any other way.

With all the things out there to buy, people generally don’t prioritize bicycles. I can understand this because of how bicycles are marketed in the US: as toys for rich yuppies or outdoorsy trail riders, as kid throwbacks, or for ambling around parks on summer days.

But imagine that, for the cost of one or two car payments, you can have:

1. A mode of transport that’s as fast as a city bus, but goes exactly where you want it to. And you don’t have to spend 15 minutes waiting for it every morning.

2. A low-impact exercise machine that provides both aerobic and anaerobic exercise and, if properly done, is almost as easy on your joints as swimming. No gym contracts, no closed hours. And if you don’t like it, you can sell it for almost what you bought it for instead of just losing membership money. Oh yeah, and it drops you off at work after your morning workout.

3. A craft and hobby. Bikes are simple to repair if you want to invest in a few tools, and knowing how to wrench is a good bartering skill. Bikes are highly customizable to your personal needs and style.

4. No more insurance, excise tax, parking tickets/permits, rising gas, monthly passes, etc. etc. etc. Repair bills now cost $50 instead of $500. Tune-ups are $30. IF you can’t do them yourself.

5. Arriving at work in the morning morning feeling refreshed and on endorphins, without the coffee. Feeling fit. Intimately knowing the seasons. Feeling satisfied that you’re pulling your own weight, and making your city a better place.

I could go on and on. As much as cyclists argue about the environmental benefits of cycling, the truth is that cars could run on rainbows and hugs and we’d still be on our bikes.

I’ll defer (as I often do) to Robert Hurst, in his The Art of Urban Cycling. He says exactly what I want to:

“Riding a bike allows a person to pack more life in a day. As Americans, we know all too well that the car driver often finds himself caught in a void, a void of dead space and time. The time spent driving to th store, to work, caught in traffic, attention vaguely drifting from the road ahead to the radio and back, is so nondescript, so forgettable, it is lost forever. Did the driver really live these minutes spent in motorized transit? Technically. On the bike, it is vastly different. This is actual living. Blood and oxygen pumping, muscles straining. There is a sense of being a true part of the world, a participant in one’s own life, rather than simply watching it pass by on a big screen.

Bicycling is better. Life is too precious to spend it in a car.“

I enjoy the empty streets this time of year. The only cyclists on the roads are ones either experienced or crazy enough to brave the New England winds. No morons in the bike lane wobbling around. Drivers think you’re totally nuts, and give you extra space. If you know your stuff, you’re warm.

But the problem is that it’s lonely. There’s no community. Just a few pedal-ships zipping through the extra-long nights, legs cranking to keep the warmth going until they reach their destination. No chat, no complimenting bikes, just business.

Much as I hate to say it, it’s worse than the summer drones.

So how do we get The People out? How do we keep the cycling community on their bikes? How do we make normal people into year-round rebels, defying common assumptions and the lure of the fossil fuel barons that hide behind every subway car?

Education, Comrades. Education.

I have traveled these streets as a commuter for two years now. I’m not new enough to make the same old mistakes, but I’m not old enough to forget what it’s like to be new.

This is my Commutist Manifesto. I seek to spread commutism to the masses by educating them, from their naked infancy, into full Cycle Comrades. I do not cater to the converted, nor pander to the ignorant. I simply aim to educate and provide good sense based on my own frustrations.

Herein are the Cardinal Truths of the Commutist Manifesto:

1) The proletariat fears spending money on unknown ideas. The Manifesto will try to ease these expenses in the long-term view.

2) The proletariat must not fall into the deathly Cult of Equipment, and must understand that the well-built thigh trumps the $2000 crotch rocket.

3) The proletariat has little use for flashy toys, but seeks a tool that brings joy alongside utility.

4) The proletariat will not believe in the Cycle Revolution inherently, but must be convinced through good sense and good will that there is value to Cycle Camaraderie. If they do not doubt, they are not worth having.

From these tenets we launch forth. Wheelers of the world, unite!