Bike Night Ride Quotes

I can’t function here anymore. I mean in life: I can’t function in this life. I’m no better off than when I was in bed last night, with one difference: when I was in my own bed—or my mom’s—I could do something about it; now that I’m here I can’t do anything. I can’t ride my bike to the Brooklyn Bridge; I can’t take a whole bunch of pills and go for the good sleep; the only thing I can do is crush my head in the toilet seat, and I still don’t even know if that would work. They take away your options and all you can do is live, and it’s just like Humble said: I’m not afraid of dying; I’m afraid of living. I was afraid before, but I’m afraid even more now that I’m a public joke. The teachers are going to hear from the students. They’ll think I’m trying to make an excuse for bad work.

ALTERNATE UNIVERSE IN WHICH I AM UNFAZED BY THE MEN WHO DO NOT LOVE ME when the businessman shoulder checks me in the airport, i do not apologize. instead, i write him an elegy on the back of a receipt and tuck it in his hand as i pass through the first class cabin. like a bee, he will die after stinging me. i am twenty-four and have never cried. once, a boy told me he doesn’t “believe in labels” so i embroidered the word chauvinist on the back of his favorite coat. a boy said he liked my hair the other way so i shaved my head instead of my pussy. while the boy isn’t calling back, i learn carpentry, build a desk, write a book at the desk. i taught myself to cum from counting ceiling tiles. the boy says he prefers blondes and i steam clean his clothes with bleach. the boy says i am not marriage material and i put gravel in his pepper grinder. the boy says period sex is disgusting and i slaughter a goat in his living room. the boy does not ask if he can choke me, so i pretend to die while he’s doing it. my mother says this is not the meaning of unfazed. when the boy says i curse too much to be pretty and i tattoo “cunt” on my inner lip, my mother calls this “being very fazed.” but left over from the other universe are hours and hours of waiting for him to kiss me and here, they are just hours. here, they are a bike ride across long island in june. here, they are a novel read in one sitting. here, they are arguments about god or a full night’s sleep. here, i hand an hour to the woman crying outside of the bar. i leave one on my best friend’s front porch, send my mother two in the mail. i do not slice his tires. i do not burn the photos. i do not write the letter. i do not beg. i do not ask for forgiveness. i do not hold my breath while he finishes. the man tells me he does not love me, and he does not love me. the man tells me who he is, and i listen. i have so much beautiful time.

You can’t read good-night stories to your bank account, or brush its hair, or teach it how to ride a bike for the first time.

Oh, Oliver, I said to myself on my way to the kitchen for a quick bite to eat, I’ll do anything for you. I’ll ride up the hill with you, and I’ll race you up the road to town, and won’t point out the sea when we reach the berm, and I’ll wait at the bar in the piazzetta while you meet with your translator, and I’ll touch the memorial to the unknown soldier who died on the Piave, and I won’t utter a word, I’ll show you the way to the bookstore, and we’ll park our bikes outside the shop and go in together and leave together, and I promise, I promise, I promise, there’ll be no hint of Shelley, or Monet, nor will I ever stoop to tell you that two nights ago you added an annual ring to my soul.

Under-slept employees are not, therefore, going to drive your business forward with productive innovation. Like a group of people riding stationary exercise bikes, everyone looks like they are pedaling, but the scenery never changes. The irony that employees miss is that when you are not getting enough sleep, you work less productively and thus need to work longer to accomplish a goal. This means you often must work longer and later into the evening, arrive home later, go to bed later, and need to wake up earlier, creating a negative feedback loop. Why try to boil a pot of water on medium heat when you could do so in half the time on high? People often tell me that they do not have enough time to sleep because they have so much work to do. Without wanting to be combative in any way whatsoever, I respond by informing them that perhaps the reason they still have so much to do at the end of the day is precisely because they do not get enough sleep at night.

I drove a bike here. Fancy a ride on it?” “A motorcycle?” No, that wouldn’t do. No trunk to carry his body in, and I wasn’t about to balance it on the handlebars.

Dad used to say lots of funny things - like he was speaking his own language sometimes. Twenty-three skidoo, salad days, nosey parker, bandbox fresh, the catbird seat, chocolate teapot, and something about Grandma sucking eggs. One of his favourites was 'safe as houses'. Teaching me to ride a bike, my mother worrying in the doorway: "Calm down, Linda, this street is as safe as houses." Convincing Jamie to sleep without his nightlight: "It's as safe as houses in here, son, not a monster for miles." Then overnight the world turned into a hideous nightmare, and the phrase became a black joke to Jamie and me. Houses were the most dangerous places we knew. Hiding in a patch of scrubby pines, watching a car pull out from the garage of a secluded home, deciding whether to make a food run, whether it was too dicey. "Do you think the parasites'll be long gone?" "No way - that place is as safe as houses. Let's get out of here." And now I can sit here and watch TV like it is five years ago and Mom and Dad are in the other room and i've never spent a night hiding in a drainpipe with Jamie and a bunch of rats while bodysnatchers with spotlights search for the thieves who made off with a bag of dried beans and a bowl of cold spaghetti. I know that if Jamie and I survived alone for twenty years we would never find this feeling on our own. The feeling of safety. More than safety, even - happiness. Safe and happy, two things I thought i'd never feel again. Jared made us feel that way without trying, just be being Jared. I breathe in the scent of his skin and feel the warmth of his body under mine. Jared makes everything safe, everything happy. Even houses.

Despair. I’d been told I suffered from it too. The thing was, I never sensed myself in despair, but rather, in love with something I felt closest to only when walking or riding my bike in the city. I felt it when I kept my windows open all night, or sitting on the rickety wood of the porch my landlord called a fire escape, peeled paint flaking under my hands and feet, looking over the empty lot. It had to do with a texture, with the moon and a stray white cat I’d been feeding, a cat that saw me as home now.

Montreal is nothing like Manhattan; it’s smaller and more concentrated, and unlike the city that never sleeps, Montreal feels like a city that’s gotten a good night’s rest and woken up in time for a bike ride alongside the Saint Lawrence River.

Roman candles and Saturn missiles spark and whistle. Bigger fireworks light up the night with flares while smoke and the scent of black powder blows with the breeze. Dogs bark and locusts buzz while kids ride their bikes up and down the streets. As other families relax together, sipping lemonade and cold Coronas, I’m sitting on the roof, listening to mine tear itself apart.

Here's a note to the parents of addicted children: choose your music carefully. Avoid Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World", from the Polaroid or Kodak or whichever commercial, and the songs "Turn Around" and "Sunrise, Sunset" and - there are thousands more. Avoid Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time," and this one, Eric Clapton's song about his son. Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" sneaked up on me one time. The music doesn't have to be sentimental. Springsteen can be dangerous. John and Yoko. Bjork. Dylan. I become overwhelmed when I hear Nirvana. I want to scream like Kurt Cobain. I want to scream at him. Music isn't all that does it. There are millions of treacherous moments. Driving along Highway 1, I will see a peeling wave. Or I will reach the fork where two roads meet near Rancho Nicasio, where we veered to the left in carpool. A shooting star on a still night at the crest of Olema Hill. With friends, I hear a good joke - one that Nic would appreciate. The kids do something funny or endearing. A story. A worn sweater. A movie. Feeling wind and looking up, riding my bike. A million moments.

Really, in a lot of ways being a cyclist is like being a vampire. First of all, both cyclists and vampires are cultural outcasts with cult followings who clumsily walk the line between cool and dorky. Secondly, both cyclists and vampires resemble normal humans, but they also lead secret double lives, have supernatural powers, and aren’t governed by the same rules as the rest of humanity—though cycling doesn’t come with the drawbacks of vampirism. Cyclists can ride day or night, we can consume all the garlic we want, and very few of us are afflicted with bloodlust or driven by a relentless urge to kill.

Don't forget to get away every once in awhile, To lose yourself in a book Or in the woods behind your home Ride your bike into the sunset, Sit on your front steps and count the cars passing by, Lay on your roof and gaze up at the night sky, Drive along backroads with the windows rolled down Listening to nothing but the sound of rushing wind I hope you take the time to be alone, To sort through the cluttered shelves of your heart I hope you take the time to be silent, To close your eyes and just listen I hope you take the time to be still, To quiet your mind and experience the beauty Of simply Being

Pulling to a stop in front of Aly’s house, I take a deep breath. With a flick of my wrist, I cut the engine and listen to the silence. I’ve sat in this exact spot more times than I can count. In many ways, Aly’s house is like my sanctuary. A place I go when my own home feels like a graveyard. I glance up at the bedroom window of the girl who knows me better than anyone, the only person I let see me cry after Dad died. I won’t let this experiment take that or her away from me. Tonight, I’m going to prove that Aly and I can go back to our normal, easy friendship. Throwing open my door, I trudge up her sidewalk, plant my feet outside her front door, and ring the bell. “Coming!” I step back and see Aly stick her head out of her second-story window. “No problem,” I call back up. “Take your time.” More time to get my head on straight. Aly disappears behind a film of yellow curtain, and I turn to look out at the quiet neighborhood. Up and down the street, the lights blink on, filling the air with a low hum that matches the thrumming of my nerves. Across the street, old Mr. Lawson sits at his usual perch under a gigantic American flag, drinking beer and mumbling to himself. Two little girls ride their bikes around the cul-de-sac, smiling and waving. Just a normal, run-of-the-mill Friday night. Except not. I thrust my hands into my pockets, jiggling the loose change from my Taco Bell run earlier tonight, and grab my pack of Trident. I toss a stick into my mouth and chew furiously. Supposedly, the smell of peppermint can calm your nerves. I grab a second stick and shove it in, too. With the clacking sound of Aly’s shoes approaching the door behind me, I remind myself again about tonight’s mission. All I need is focus. I take another deep breath for good measure and rock back on my heels, ready to greet my best friend. She opens the door, wearing a black dress molded to her skin, and I let the air out in one big huff.

Months later, when I rarely saw the Angels, I still had the legacy of the big machine -- four hundred pounds of chrome and deep red noise to take out on the Coast Highway and cut loose at three in the morning, when all the cops were lurking over on 101. My first crash had wrecked the bike completely and it took several months to have it rebuilt. After that I decided to ride it differently: I would stop pushing my luck on curves, always wear a helmet and try to keep within range of the nearest speed limit ... my insurance had already been canceled and my driver's license was hanging by a thread. So it was always at night, like a werewolf, that I would take the thing out for an honest run down the coast. I would start in Golden Gate Park, thinking only to run a few long curves to clear my head ... but in a matter of minutes I'd be out at the beach with the sound of the engine in my ears, the surf booming up on the sea wall and a fine empty road stretching all the way down to Santa Cruz ... not even a gas station in the whole seventy miles; the only public light along the way is an all-night diner down around Rockaway Beach. There was no helmet on those nights, no speed limit, and no cooling it down on the curves. The momentary freedom of the park was like the one unlucky drink that shoves a wavering alcoholic off the wagon. I would come out of the park near the soccer field and pause for a moment at the stop sign, wondering if I knew anyone parked out there on the midnight humping strip.

If you ever get married and have kids, and they offer you a job that will take you thirty fucking light-years away from home, tell them to smooch your taint. Even if they offer a hundred percent monthly bonus. You can’t read good-night stories to your bank account, or brush its hair, or teach it how to ride a bike for the first time.

I suddenly remember an old game I used to play when I was nine or ten, and I was allowed to ride my bike until it got dark. I used to make little bets with myself as I watched the sun getting lower and lower on the horizon: If I hold my breath to twenty seconds, the night won't come. If I don't blink. If I stand so still a fly lands on my cheek. Now, I find myself doing the same thing, bargaining to keep Kate, even though that isn't the way it works.

It is now time to face the fact that English is a crazy language — the most loopy and wiggy of all tongues. In what other language do people drive in a parkway and park in a driveway? In what other language do people play at a recital and recite at a play? Why does night fall but never break and day break but never fall? Why is it that when we transport something by car, it’s called a shipment, but when we transport something by ship, it’s called cargo? Why does a man get a hernia and a woman a hysterectomy? Why do we pack suits in a garment bag and garments in a suitcase? Why do privates eat in the general mess and generals eat in the private mess? Why do we call it newsprint when it contains no printing but when we put print on it, we call it a newspaper? Why are people who ride motorcycles called bikers and people who ride bikes called cyclists? Why — in our crazy language — can your nose run and your feet smell?Language is like the air we breathe. It’s invisible, inescapable, indispensable, and we take it for granted. But, when we take the time to step back and listen to the sounds that escape from the holes in people’s faces and to explore the paradoxes and vagaries of English, we find that hot dogs can be cold, darkrooms can be lit, homework can be done in school, nightmares can take place in broad daylight while morning sickness and daydreaming can take place at night, tomboys are girls and midwives can be men, hours — especially happy hours and rush hours — often last longer than sixty minutes, quicksand works very slowly, boxing rings are square, silverware and glasses can be made of plastic and tablecloths of paper, most telephones are dialed by being punched (or pushed?), and most bathrooms don’t have any baths in them. In fact, a dog can go to the bathroom under a tree —no bath, no room; it’s still going to the bathroom. And doesn’t it seem a little bizarre that we go to the bathroom in order to go to the bathroom? Why is it that a woman can man a station but a man can’t woman one, that a man can father a movement but a woman can’t mother one, and that a king rules a kingdom but a queen doesn’t rule a queendom? How did all those Renaissance men reproduce when there don’t seem to have been any Renaissance women? Sometimes you have to believe that all English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane: In what other language do they call the third hand on the clock the second hand? Why do they call them apartments when they’re all together? Why do we call them buildings, when they’re already built? Why it is called a TV set when you get only one? Why is phonetic not spelled phonetically? Why is it so hard to remember how to spell mnemonic? Why doesn’t onomatopoeia sound like what it is? Why is the word abbreviation so long? Why is diminutive so undiminutive? Why does the word monosyllabic consist of five syllables? Why is there no synonym for synonym or thesaurus? And why, pray tell, does lisp have an s in it? If adults commit adultery, do infants commit infantry? If olive oil is made from olives, what do they make baby oil from? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian consume? If pro and con are opposites, is congress the opposite of progress? ...

My hour with my phone off starts shortly after I get home from work. This is one of the hardest times of the day because my children are ramped up for my attention, but I’m still trying to come down from the workday. My habit is to get changed, make one final email check to make sure things are in order at the office—and if not, to tell someone that I’ll get back to them later that night—and then to turn it off and put it in my dresser drawer. It’s a weird feeling, almost like hiding a valuable under a mattress. You walk away but your mind stays on it. You can visualize it sitting there in the dark. But whether the boys and I are riding bikes to the park, initiating a royal rumble on the living room floor, or setting the table together, my presence is fundamentally different that hour of the day. I am with them. Whatever we’re doing, it is together.

there is nothing generic about a human life. When I was little, to get to my bus stop, I had to cross a field that had so much snow my parents fitted me with ski pants and knee-high thermal boots that were toasty to forty degrees below zero. I am excellent in the stern of a canoe, but I never got the hang of riding a bike with no hands. I have seen the northern lights because my parents always woke up the whole house when the night sky was painted with color. I love the smell of clover and chamomile because my sister and I used to pick both on the way home from swimming lessons. I spent weeks of my childhood riding around on my bike saving drowning worms after a heavy rain. My hair is my favorite feature even though it’s too heavy for most ponytails, and I still can’t parallel park. There is no life in general. Each day has been a collection of trivial details—little intimacies and jokes and screw-ups and realizations.

When Surkov finds out about the Night Wolves he is delighted. The country needs new patriotic stars, the great Kremlin reality show is open for auditions, and the Night Wolves are just the type that’s needed, helping the Kremlin rewrite the narrative of protesters from political injustice and corruption to one of Holy Russia versus Foreign Devils, deflecting the conversation from the economic slide and how the rate of bribes that bureaucrats demand has shot up from 15 percent to 50 percent of any deal. They will receive Kremlin support for their annual bike show and rock concert in Crimea, the one-time jewel in the Tsarist Empire that ended up as part of Ukraine during Soviet times, and where the Night Wolves use their massive shows to call for retaking the peninsula from Ukraine and restoring the lands of Greater Russia; posing with the President in photo ops in which he wears Ray-Bans and leathers and rides a three-wheel Harley (he can’t quite handle a two-wheeler); playing mega-concerts to 250,000 cheering fans celebrating the victory at Stalingrad in World War II and the eternal Holy War Russia is destined to fight against the West, with Cirque du Soleil–like trapeze acts, Spielberg-scale battle reenactments, religious icons, and holy ecstasies—in the middle of which come speeches from Stalin, read aloud to the 250,000 and announcing the holiness of the Soviet warrior—after which come more dancing girls and then the Night Wolves’ anthem, “Slavic Skies”: We are being attacked by the yoke of the infidels: But the sky of the Slavs boils in our veins . . . Russian speech rings like chain-mail in the ears of the foreigners, And the white host rises from the coppice to the stars.

Meanwhile, Trucker and I, through all of this, had been renting that cottage together, on a country estate six miles outside of Bristol. We were paying a tiny rent, as the place was so rundown, with no heating or modern conveniences. But I loved it. The cottage overlooked a huge green valley on one side and had beautiful woodland on the other. We had friends around most nights, held live music parties, and burned wood from the dilapidated shed as heating for the solid-fuel stove. Our newly found army pay was spent on a bar tab in the local pub. We were probably the tenants from hell, as we let the garden fall into disrepair, and burned our way steadily through the wood of the various rotting sheds in the garden. But heh, the landlord was a miserable old sod with a terrible reputation, anyway! When the grass got too long we tried trimming it--but broke both our string trimmers. Instead we torched the garden. This worked a little too well, and we narrowly avoided burning down the whole cottage as the fire spread wildly. What was great about the place was that we could get in and out of Bristol on our 100 cc motorbikes, riding almost all the way on little footpaths through the woods--without ever having to go on any roads. I remember one night, after a fun evening out in town, Trucker and I were riding our motorbikes back home. My exhaust started to malfunction--glowing red, then white hot--before letting out one massive backfire and grinding to a halt. We found some old fence wire in the dark and Trucker towed me all the way home, both of us crying with laughter. From then on my bike would only start by rolling it down the farm track that ran down the steep valley next to our house. If the motorbike hadn’t jump-started by the bottom I would have to push the damn thing two hundred yards up the hill and try again. It was ridiculous, but kept me fit--and Trucker amused. Fun days.

Zarmina was a Muslim, accused of blasphemy like me. Her story was totally absurd. She had just got married when she and her husband had a motorbike crash in Shergarh, several hours’ drive from here. Luckily they weren’t badly hurt, but when her husband lost control of the bike with Zarmina riding pillion behind him, it careered into a monument dedicated to the Prophet Muhammad. Zarmina and her husband were both accused of blasphemy and thrown into prison. And now Zarmina is dead. She was nice; I will miss her. Why have we two been accused of blasphemy, my Muslim sister who died last night and me? I don’t understand it. Have people gone mad?

I do not know if this is love or what love is or if love's a thing, if it can be worn like an old coat, or felt like harsh fabric on naked flesh, or if it is a sensation, like that first time the brakes of my bike failed while riding downhill or the climax of masturbation, or if love is an invention, and we all manufacture our own versions - some bright, some dull, some marbled, but all with labels and stickers that say: this is love. I do not know what love is or if I can say what I think love is, could be or should be. If we were to ever sit on the marble floor, on one of those dry, electricity free, 45 degree Delhi nights, sharing a drink of Old Monk's and I were to tell you that this is love, slap me for I would either be drunk or a liar. and if i were drunk, I won't be drunk on love or your loving for I don't know what love is or if it can be known. Maybe, one night, after thirty years of searching for what love means, we will sit outside - you and I - amidst the debris of our meanderings, our bent backs resting on the rusted iron railing, our skin pimpled, throats scratched from prayers uttered to absent gods and we would be in love and believe that love is this: love is all the spaces, non-events, the unspoken words and everything in between the first second of these thirty years to this. Love is this.

I do not know what love is I do not know if this is love or what love is or if love's a thing, if it can be worn like an old coat, or felt like harsh fabric on naked flesh, or if it is a sensation, like that first time the brakes of my bike failed while riding downhill or the climax of masturbation, or if love is an invention, and we all manufacture our own versions - some bright, some dull, some marbled, but all with labels and stickers that say: this is love. I do not know what love is or if I can say what I think love is, could be or should be. If we were to ever sit on the marble floor, on one of those dry, electricity free, 45 degree Delhi nights, sharing a drink of Old Monk's and I were to tell you that this is love, slap me for I would either be drunk or a liar. and if i were drunk, I won't be drunk on love or your loving for I don't know what love is or if it can be known. Maybe, one night, after thirty years of searching for what love means, we will sit outside - you and I - amidst the debris of our meanderings, our bent backs resting on the rusted iron railing, our skin pimpled, throats scratched from prayers uttered to absent gods and we would be in love and believe that love is this: love is all the spaces, non-events, the unspoken words and everything in between the first second of these thirty years to this. Love is this.

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They say that love has never been immortal. That it is only the songs, books, and movies which instill this thought in our mind. But tell me then why does my heart yearn to just have a glimpse of you every moment of my life? Why do I see you in every sunrise? Why do I see you in every sunset? Why do I think of you when I walk down the lane of my apartment? Why do I imagine you sitting beside me while riding my bike? Why do I inhale your fragrance around me in my days and in my nights? Why do I keep missing you? Why do I feel restless untill I have spoken to you? Why do I keep thinking about you every night lying there in my bed? Why do I feel incomplete without you in my life? Why do all my memories smell of you?

Jeremiah declined, even though night fishing was his favorite. He was always trying to get people to go night fishing with him. That night he said he wasn’t in the mood. So they left, and Jeremiah stayed behind, with me. We watched TV and played cards. We spent most of the summer doing that, just us. We cemented things between us that summer. He’d wake me up early some mornings, and we would go collect shells or sand crabs, or ride our bikes to the ice cream place three miles away. When it was just us two, he didn’t joke around as much, but he was still Jeremiah. From that summer on I felt closer to Jeremiah than I did to my own brother. Jeremiah was nicer. Maybe because he was somebody’s little sibling too, or maybe just because he was that kind of person. He was nice to everybody. He had a talent for making people feel comfortable.

Most of us are banged up, bandaged, or in physical pain in some form or another due to the battle that started the minute Dom lost his. A fight we all lost, no matter how many of us escaped breathing because the aftermath is fucking excruciating. Our new reality surreal. One in which our magnet no longer exists. Flashes of my brother shutter in. The day we met. Our first late-night bike ride. Sharing our first stolen beer. Coughing through our first joint. Our high school homeroom theatrics. The shared pains of growing from boys to men.

That guy had a job before you environmentalists took it away. Now he has nothing to do but ride his bike, his only treasure, then go home at night to terrorize his children and beat his wife. Spousal abuse is directly linked to environmental regulation. It can be stamped out only by stamping out nature—not human nature, the other one. That alone will provide jobs and stop the breakdown of the American family.

Do you need a ride?” He said again. “No, actually.” “Come on. I’ll take you home.” I don’t need a ride. That’s my bike.” Maggie pointed to the bike at his feet. He didn’t look down at the bike, which made Maggie think he was aware all along that it was hers. “It’ll fit in my trunk.” “No, thank you. I’ll ride it home. It’s a big bike.” “It’s a big trunk.” Maggie stared at him, confused by his sudden appearance and his even more sudden interest in spending time in her company. “Why?” “It was made that way. Most of the cars made in the ‘50’s had decent sized trunks.” “Ha ha, very funny. That’s not what I meant and you know it. Why do you want to take me home?” Maggie almost smiled at his dry attempt at humor. But she didn’t. It still hurt too much to look at him, to be near him, and her smile stayed dormant. “I want to talk to you.” “I had the very distinct impression the last time we were together that I made you angry. Plus, I’m thinking your driver’s license is long expired. You shouldn’t be driving.” “Ha, ha, very funny,” Johnny mimicked her. “Have you always been such a goody-two shoes?” “Nobody says goody-two-shoes anymore!” Maggie said crossly and walked to her bike, squatting beside it to undo the lock. “Maggie,” he coaxed. “Maggie?” She really tried not to look up at him. “How do you drive a blonde crazy?” Maggie’s head shot up, and her eyes locked on his. “You put him in a round room and tell him to sit in the corner,” Johnny quipped, but his eyes were serious. “Not bad, Kinross. Did you make that up yourself?

Do you want me to walk with you to class?” I ask as she gets off the bike and unclips the helmet. She holds it out to me and smiles, shaking her head. “I can find it.” She leans forward and presses her lips to mine. I pull her closer, not ready to give her up yet. She’s looking all fresh faced and excited with her hair up in a ponytail and her backpack slung over her shoulders. She says something against my lips, and I sit back so I can see her face. Thanks for the ride, she signs. You’re very welcome. God, she’s so pretty. She grins and blushes. Thanks for the one last night, too. I go hard immediately. Be careful, I warn. Or what? she teases. I jerk her to me with a quick tug to her scarf, and she laughs. I can feel the quake of her stomach against my hip. I fucking love you so much, I say. I can’t seem to stop telling her. She rolls her eyes, kisses me quickly and says, I just love it when you get all romantic. I love you, too. I spin her toward her building and tap her on the ass. I have something I need to take care of this morning. Something really important. She waves at me as she walks away, her fingers barely moving. Then she holds up the I love you sign, and I know my name is written right below it.

Jake flattened the knife against the wall, filling the crevice. It was all he could do to smother a grin. He didn’t know which he’d enjoyed more, spending a couple hours alone with the kids or finding new ways to provoke Meridith. And to think he was getting paid. Maybe once she went back outside, the kids would come down and pretend to play a game at the kitchen bar while they talked. He could hear Meridith talking to them now, asking them about the game they’d supposedly been playing, acting all interested in their activities. If she really cared about them, she wouldn’t be ripping the kids from Summer Place just so she could go back and live happily ever after with her fiancé. And he was pretty sure that’s what she was planning. Their voices grew louder, then Jake saw them all descending the steps. Noelle led the pack, carrying her Uno cards, followed by the boys, then Meridith. Noelle winked on her way past. Little imp. The kids perched at the bar, and he heard the cards being shuffled. Dipping his knife into the mud, Jake sneaked a peek. Meridith was opening the dishwasher. Great. Ben kept turning to look at him, and Jake discreetly shook his head. Even though Meridith faced the other way, no need to be careless. “Noelle, you haven’t said anything about your uncle lately. He hasn’t e-mailed yet?” He felt three pairs of eyes on his back. He hoped Meridith was shelving something. Jake smoothed the mud and turned to gather more, an excuse to appraise the scene. Meridith’s back was turned. He gave the kids a look. “Uh, no, he hasn’t e-mailed.” “Or called or nothing,” Max added. Noelle silently nudged him, and Max gave an exaggerated shrug. What? “Well, let me know when he does. I don’t want to keep pestering you.” “Sure thing,” Noelle said, dealing the cards. Her eyes flickered toward him. “I was thinking we might go for a bike ride this evening,” Meridith said. “Maybe go up to ’Sconset or into town. You all have bikes, right?” “I forgot to tell you,” Noelle said. “I’m going to Lexi’s tonight. I’m spending the night.” “Who’s Lexi?” “A friend from church. You met her mom last week.” A glass clinked as she placed it in the cupboard. “Noelle, I’m not sure how things were . . . before . . . but you have to ask permission for things like this. I don’t even know Lexi, much less her family.” “I know them.” “Have you spent the night before?” “No, but I’ve been to her house tons of times.” He heard a dishwasher rack rolling in, another rolling out, the dishes rattling. “Why don’t we have her family over for dinner one night this week? I could get to know them, and then we’ll see about overnight plans.” “This is ridiculous. They go to our church, and her mom and my mom were friends!” Noelle cast him a look. See? she said with her eyes. Did Meridith think Eva would jeopardize her daughter’s safety? The woman was neurotic. Jake clamped his teeth together before something slipped out. “Just because they go to church doesn’t necessarily make them safe, Noelle. It wouldn’t be responsible to let you spend the night with people I don’t know. You never know what goes on behind closed doors.” “My mom would let me.” The air seemed to vibrate with tension. Jake realized his knife was still, flattened against the wall, and he reached for more mud. Noelle was glaring at Meridith, who’d turned, wielding a spatula. Was she going to blow it? To her credit, the woman drew a deep breath, holding her temper. “Maybe Lexi could stay all night with you instead.” “Well, wouldn’t that pose a problem for her family, since they don’t know you?” Despite his irritation with Meridith, Jake’s lips twitched. Score one for Noelle. “I suppose that would be up to her family.” He heard Noelle’s cards hit the table, her chair screech across the floor as she stood. “Never mind.” She cast Meridith one final glare, then exited through the back door, closing it with a hearty slam.

Today my friend Julie let me bring her dinner. Her husband, Doug, had two very scary seizures in the last two days, and a zillion tests and scans and appointments with neurologists. They had just come home from the hospital, and they were sitting on the front porch when I drove up, and Lilly, their three-year-old, was riding her big-girl bike on the sidewalk in her pink underpants. It was ninety-four degrees today, and they were exhausted. Being with them made me think about the idea that everything is okay. That idea is cruel in its untruth. The bottom just falls out sometimes, and nobody is exempt. I can’t take away the seizures or tell Lilly that it’s never going to happen again, although I would if I could. But I can be there, and I can feed them, and I can listen to their stories, of funny things the doctors said, and the strange and infuriating things family members invariably say in tense situations. I can sit in silence in the heat and stillness of a sticky June night, knowing that everything is not okay, but that this tiny moment is.

Eton, for all its virtues, seriously lacked girls. (Well, apart from the kitchen girls who we camped out on the roof waiting for night after night.) But beyond that, and the occasional foxy daughter of a teacher, it was a desert. (Talking of foxy daughters, I did desperately fancy the beautiful Lela, who was the daughter of the clarinet teacher. But she ended up marrying one of my best friends from Eton, Tom Amies--and everyone was very envious. Great couple. Anyway, we digress.) As I said, apart from that…it was a desert. All of us wrote to random girls whom we vaguely knew or had maybe met once, but if we were honest, it was all in never-never land. I did meet one quite nice girl who I discovered went to school relatively nearby to Eton. (Well, about thirty miles nearby, that is.) I borrowed a friend’s very old, single-geared, rusty bicycle and headed off one Sunday afternoon to meet this girl. It took me hours and hours to find the school, and the bike became steadily more and more of an epic to ride, not only in terms of steering but also just to pedal, as the rust cogs creaked and ground. But finally I reached the school gates, pouring with sweat. It was a convent school, I found out, run entirely by nuns. Well, at least they should be quite mild-natured and easy to give the slip to, I thought. That was my first mistake. I met the girl as prearranged, and we wandered off down a pretty, country path through the local woods. I was just summoning up the courage to make a move when I heard this whistle, followed by this shriek, from somewhere behind us. I turned to see a nun with an Alsatian, running toward us, shouting. The young girl gave me a look of terror and pleaded with me to run for my life--which I duly did. I managed to escape and had another monster cycle ride back to school, thinking: Flipping Nora, this girl business is proving harder work than I first imagined. But I persevered.

We can’t afford to build places where people just park their bodies at night,” Burden said. “We can’t afford to spend a single transportation dollar that doesn’t increase land value rather than decrease it.” We should go back to building towns the way our great-grandparents did, he suggested. Most people today want to live in a community where they don’t have to drive long distances. They want to live near enough to the stores and jobs so they can walk, take a bus, or ride a bike wherever they need to go. If Muscatine wanted to stay competitive, retain existing businesses, attract new ones, and have money in the treasury for parks and other amenities, then the best thing residents could do would be to focus on making their town walkable and livable, Burden said. That meant adding sidewalks, improving crosswalks, replacing intersections with roundabouts in some places, and converting one-way streets to run in both directions. “One-way streets help move people faster,” Burden said. “But is that your goal? To empty out downtown?” You should be doing just the opposite, he argued. You want people to linger downtown and enjoy themselves. “Then, before you know it, your children won’t be moving off to other cities. Everything they want will be right here in your own community.

The Resonance of Honeyed Summer Elizabethan Sonnet Sequence abab, cdcd, efef, gg Synchronous in honeyed summer sings a choir of tremulous birch leaves, A sweet breeze surges south from the mountains to cool down the farm. To a white picket fence, among the honeybees, a steadfast garden cleaves, After blind disregard by a town plow, mended again from winter harm. A sensual scent of new mown meadow, the clash of croquet mallet to ball, A ricochet sings a tin din of two wickets and a knock into a winning stake. By the barn, night owls howl, by day gleeful wee hummingbirds enthrall. The mirth of dipping children as wakes of droning motorboats lap a lake. Bluebirds have woven a love nest in a stilted, rough-hewn, wooden house. By a stonewall wild berries grow swollen from green to a misty blue hue. As we ride bikes beside a hayfield, we rouse the flight of a russet grouse. At dawn a doe and fawn cross our lawn leaving hoof prints upon the dew. In long lemonade days, rocking and sipping on the porch, in our defense, We're in awe of honeyed summertime and the harmony of its resonance. + + +

Debbie Simoncini-Rosenfeld, vice president of an insurance company, was trying to deal with her eight-year-old daughter, Jessica, “screaming and yelling” to stay up later than her 8:30 bedtime. Her daughter wanted to read later at night. So Debbie traded her daughter a 9:30 P.M. bedtime in exchange for no bare-belly shirts at school and no riding her bike in the street. Debbie valued her daughter’s decorum and safety more than a later bedtime; her daughter valued a later bedtime more than decorum and safety. “Children like to be involved in making the rules,” Debbie said. “If they get something, they will give up something.

naked bicyclists stage festive Portland protest ride By Shelby Sebens PORTLAND Oregon (Reuters) - Thousands of bicyclists, many of them stark naked, poured into the streets of Portland, Oregon on Saturday night for the 11th annual World Naked Bike Ride, a protest that promotes bike riding as an alternative to driving cars.

When he was young, he had thick black hair and he roared around on a Norton Commando, giving girls rides to school on the back of his bike. That’s how he met my mom. He was a senior, she was a sophomore. She got pregnant two months later. They never married, but they lived together for a couple of years in my grandmother’s basement. My dad was crazy about my mom. She really was gorgeous, and smart. He told her to keep going to school while he worked days as a mechanic and took care of me at night.

It was tennis morning, noon, and night. You slept it, you ate it, but that was never forced on me. I would get up at 6 o’clock in the morning to ride my bike, eight or nine miles sometimes, to get to the club matches. We’d play all day, and people would say, ‘Weren’t you tired after cycling all that way?’ Well, that wasn’t even thought of. It was just the opportunity to play.

Thinking about how Finlay never abandoned me, whether it was on bike rides as children, or in hotel rooms as grown-ups.

There was so much to think about and so much to do with all this activity and responsibility that he hardly had time to really consider how he missed London, the hum of it, the Brixton roar and the beloved river, the West Indian take aways, the glittering of the tower blocks at night, the mobile phone shacks, the Africans in Peckham, the common proximity of plantain, the stern beauty of church women on Sunday mornings, the West End, the art in the air, the music in the air, the sense of possibility. He missed the tube, the telephone boxes. He even missed, deep down, the wicked parking inspectors and the heartless bus drivers who flew past queues of freezing pedestrians out of spite. He missed riding from Loughborough to Surrey Quays on his bike with the plane trees whizzing by, the sight of some long-weaved woman walking along in tight jeans and a studded belt and look-at-me boots and maybe a little boy holding her hand. The skylines, the alleyways, and yes, the sirens and helicopters and the hit of life, all these things he knew so well. And the fact, most of all, that he belonged there in a way that he would never, could never, belong in Dorking. He was outside, displaced. He was off the A-Z. He felt, in a very fundamental way, that he was living outside of his life, outside of himself. And the problem was, if indeed it was a problem – how could you call something like this a problem when there were bills to pay and children to feed and a house to maintain? – the problem was that he did not know what to do about it, how to get rid of this feeling, how to get to a place where he felt that he was in the right place. And this not being such a serious problem, not really a problem at all, he had suppressed it and accepted things as they were.

I know. But everyone rides without lights, at least all decent riders do. And if you tied a lantern around a dog’s neck, what do you think would happen, Stokes? It would be quite dazzled and not know which way to go.” “Get its hair burnt off, more likely,” said Stoker. “But if it was alone in the dark,” continued Tony, disregarding this interruption, “it would find its way anywhere by instinct. I bet if you put me anywhere around about sixty miles from here with the bike, in the middle of the night, I’d find my way home. I have a kind of instinct like a dog.

Today in El Paso all the planes are asleep on the runway. The world is in a delay. All the political consultants drinking whiskey keep their heads down, lifting them only to look at the beautiful scarred waitress who wears typewriter keys as a necklace. They jingle when she brings them drinks. Outside the giant plate glass windows the planes are completely covered in snow, it piles up on the wings. I feel like a mountain of cell phone chargers. Each of the various faiths of our various fathers keeps us only partly protected. I don’t want to talk on the phone to an angel. At night before I go to sleep I am already dreaming. Of coffee, of ancient generals, of the faces of statues each of which has the eternal expression of one of my feelings. I examine my feelings without feeling anything. I ride my blue bike on the edge of the desert. I am president of this glass of water.

He feeds me a hearty dinner, and together we watch dubbed movies late into the night. And there’s Panadería La Union, about which I hear stories months before I actually arrive. Its location is triple-ringed excitedly on my dog-eared map, and a note scrawled to the side: ‘Bakery. Delicious empanadas and cakes. Hosts cyclists for free.

If you happen to be out at night on the bike path without a light, ring your bell constantly. No bell? Then sing "Hotel Yorba" on a continuous loop, loud enough to warn the unseen.