Many a beautiful day shall pass, witnessed from behind the glass of workplace windows. This is especially true in fall and spring.
In the autumn, riders have to deal with whatever the weather throws at them, plus the shortening days, plus the increasing glare of low-angled sun. Coming off of the bountiful daylight of summer, we have to get used to the encroaching night on both ends of the day.
Drivers seem more frantic, too. I attribute this to the slow arrival of morning light. In summer, the light arrives before most of us need it, signaling our bodies and minds to wake up and get busy. In the growing light coming out of winter, we're naturally energized and sense the lengthening days moving sunset comfortably away from us. The opposite end of that process runs smack into the imposed schedule of rigid hours. We unconsciously speed up to catch up with where we need to be. Morning light drags in after we've already had to wake ourselves, while the sun slouches past us to fall below the horizon. Come late, leave early, and don't help much while you're here. Thanks a lot. The only drivers who aren't rushing around are the foliage tourists.
Right now, the foliage is just passing peak in my area. The interplay of light and color and hillsides, mountains, and water is a visual feast. The middle of many days still offers mild air and the least glary sun. It looks lovely through the shop windows. People come in and remark on how nice it is.
Yeah, well the morning ride might have been just above freezing, with areas of fog. By the time I get to ride home, the sun will be almost gone, the warmth will be fading rapidly, and any clouds will bring the dusk that much sooner. In fact, for my route, the full commute is no longer safe. Shorter options all involve more handling time, saving me no time at all if I do a park 'n' ride, and exposing my car to whatever might happen to it unattended. I can ride the full route on Sundays because the shop closes an hour earlier. Then, on November 1, sunset moves an hour earlier, so my ride opportunity on work days shifts to dawn patrols.
At dawn, the roads may be icy. The closer we get to winter, the more likely this is. The lower the sun gets, the more areas remain shaded throughout the day, preserving ice along the margins of roads that are otherwise clear for motorists. Sure, the law gives me the right to claim the clear part of the lane, but anyone who has really tried that knows that you can end up dead right. Studded tires help with the ice but make cornering on dry pavement less fun.
If you're on your bike you're not doing anything else. You might indulge in various mental games or exercises, but you're not doing the laundry, cleaning the chimney and wood stove, cooking, vacuuming, dusting, tidying up the yard, writing, drawing, whatever else you want or need to do. When daylight sprawls across fifteen hours or more, twelve of those hours are still twelve hours, but they seem to hold more. Darkness feels like night even if the same time of day was mid to late afternoon just six weeks ago.
Fall and winter have their own beauty. Starlight seems sharper in a clear, frigid sky. The northern lights seem more appropriate with arctic air in place. Before we get there, though, we have to get through the darkest, spookiest time, while the leaves are still hanging on and night's emissaries linger through the day in the long shadows.
I do have lighted bikes with which to explore the roads and trails less traveled after dark. That's all fine and dandy until you have flat tire or other mishap, miles from home on a woods road in the dark. Also, illumination makes you visible. Visibility makes you vulnerable. I don't make a big thing about being camouflaged, but I do prefer to go relatively unseen through the forest. A companion might seem to make the darkness less spooky until you think about how scary movies are all the scarier as a group gets picked off one by one. It's just a movie, right? Ha ha ha ha...hehhhhh... What's moving through the woods over there?
When the light drains away, it doesn't just seep. The sun doesn't just set sooner, it sets faster. Functional early twilight gives way to deeper, headlight-swallowing murk in a few minutes. You know what I mean: too dark to see, but somehow the powerful lights on your vehicle can't penetrate it yet. Drivers go to full glare before the sun has even disappeared. As dusk deepens, they blind each other. A rider in summer twilight can cruise in the light monochrome for half an hour. Now the silver lasts a few minutes.
On a bike commuting day, I might miss the most beautiful conditions, but when a rider comes into the shop and asks if I'm going to get out there I know that I did and I will. On a roasting hot summer day, the commuting hours are the better ones anyway. With the coming of driving season all I have is an empty space where my bike would be hanging. Not only do I lose the built-in daily ride, I lose a great teaching aid when someone asks what I think of the latest technology. "Check out this 26-year-old frame with parts that go back even further." They don't all go back that far, but they're all part of the simple, versatile approach to a machine that is seldom perfect, but reliably perfect enough. I'll be out on it when I can.
