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anyone behind. The existence of this truth messes with the individualistic and competitive side
of long distance bike riding that I feel has been inculcated in me by males in my lifetime. Not
that a male might leave someone behind for good, but I have definitely heard men tell me to not
be a pussy and pedal harder to make a light or to be annoyed at the people who ride slower and
are slowing everyone down or to keep up or else I will get lost. I felt the tendencies to feel and
think these values into my comments and mutterings along the ride, but instead, I stepped back
from my brain, held them in my palm and said to them, “No, you do not fit here. We are here to
take care of each other. We are only as strong as our weakest member. We ride as one.”
All eyes of the wombyn were on the wombyn. We kept watch over each other. One wombyn had
problems with her bike but we had tools to fix it and did. We stopped at a liquor store. We peed
in a park. A few miles before our destination, we met with the river trail and glided along in
absolute silence under la luna tranquila. She spoke to us of blue and of white, of childbearing
and of puberty.
Our final destination brought us into the large space of Solidarity Ink. We watched a film about
the Zapatistas of Mexico and wombyn spoke to us of the need for solidarity with our brothers
and sisters down south and of the need to prepare ourselves for our own revolution. We listened
with young, old, brash, and wise ears. We soaked in one more experience where caring and
convivial living swam to the surface of our consciousnesses, mounted an aquatic bicycle, and
rode 12 miles on the open sea.
Thank you for a great first ride. I look forward to many more.
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