Last night I went to bed way too excited about this blog and of course I woke up circa 5 a.m. That was the end of my night. I have so many cool ideas during the dark hours of the night but for some reason unknown to me, they do not come down so clear when I sit in the computer in the morning. Who will ever read this? That is certainly a big question, too. Worst case scenario is that nobody reads. At least writing is cheaper than going to the therapist. And simpler.
So, one thing I wanted to tell you is about the bike i did NOT buy. Here it's:
This is my bike. It does not have a name yet, any ideas? I found my bike on the street, more specifically, on one of the lawns of our condominium (I forgot to mention: We live in a condo close to Taft Corners).
My bike appeared about a year ago. It was September - I think - when I spotted it on the lawn, just lying there, abandoned. I was walking with my son on the bike path, back from school. It was not alone. She - I think this bike is a girl, look at those curves - was abandoned with a friend, another bike a little smaller than her. When I saw them I thought some local kids were riding in the area and they had left their bikes there for a moment. Maybe they went inside to get a glass of water? Maybe they went playing with something else before riding back home?
The next morning, in our walk to school, I saw the two bikes in the very same spot. That's strange, I thought. Why in the world would someone leave a bike out there the whole night? To my surprise, it was not a whole night. At least a whole week passed by with the two poor little bikes there, nobody caring for their wheels, pedals, seats and other important parts.
Where I come from, this would have never happened. Two reasons:
1 - Nobody would abandoned precious means of transportation on the street
2 - The first person to spot them would have taken them away
But here we are, in Williston, Vermont, United States of America, far away from my beloved Buenos Aires. And those two bikes were calling my name! On Sunday, I gave up. I told my sister in law - an eager biker, back then commuting everyday from Williston to Burlington - about the bikes and she said the obvious: Let's go get them.
We did, as you can see. But I was hard to convince that I was getting two - not only one - new bikes - new for me - that easily. So I began an investigation to return those bikes to the irresponsible owner/s who left them there. I not only wanted to honor my journalism career but I also wanted to make sure I was not stealing property!
This is what I did, in this order:
1 - I called Skirack in Burlington, both bikes had stickers as if they were rented or bought there, to see if they had misplaced two bikes. Nothing.
2 - I put an ad in the local newspaper, The Williston Observer, to see if someone would call to get them back. Nothing.
3 - I talked to my neighbor, a Williston police officer, and asked him what was the right thing to do in this case. He said I should probably take them to the police department and leave them there as abandoned property, but nothing was going to be done with them. He said I would
certainly not get in trouble to keep them. After all, the bikes were left on my property.
So, finally, I decided to keep the bigger bike and donate the smaller one. I thought it was a fair decision. I called Bike Recycle Vermont and my sister in law carried it to Burlington to drop it there. BRV usually asks you for a $10 donation when you take a bike so that it can be repaired it and sold to people who need it, but they said it was in such great condition that they could not ask for a single dollar. Yes, that was one of the bikes abandoned in my lawn.
After a while I began to think it was all intentional. There is someone out there who knew someone in here would take those bikes. Interestingly, they lawn they chose was just across the street from the bike path on the way out of the elementary school. Who ever you were, thank you. After all, if it was meant as a gift, that's how it was taken. I love my bike and I recently had a well-respected friend visiting who said: "I have the same bike!"
One last thing: my neighbor Megan just gave me this great seat (close up below) that I attached to my bike. Another free gift thanks to the community! I plan to take my daughter to preschool in my bike for as a long as the weather allows. We'll see how it goes. I'll tell you more about it later.
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