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Several years ago, I topped 175 pounds as I got into my comfortable job. Then I took off hiking in the cascades, became active cycling again and the pounds magically disappeared. I can't say that I dieted, except that I never filled my plate completely and stopped eating before I felt stuffed. Now alternating between 149 and 155, I feel quite comfortable and moderately healthy. Quite a reduction!
I discovered Ebay this year. There is every imaginable product available to give a second life to or to reuse. It has its similarities to the farm auctions I visited in Pennsylvania growing up.
Cycling for most of my life, my first remembered ride around the block about age five, possibly before my parents even knew I had ventured that far away from home, painted a picture for me of a larger outside world available to the cyclist. I bought a mountain bicycle in 1980, which is presently older than some of the medical students I teach.
Speaking French, Tour de France, cycling - it seems obvious that I should have a road bike. Actually I found out that I live quite close to a velodrome, the Alpenrose Velodrome, a nearly 45 degree banked concrete track. Wednesday evenings this summer I began taking lessons. That feeling of speed was new to this old mountain biker.
This year, unable to focus on anything closer than a foot away, pain that comes on without reason, the word old is progressively edging its way into my vocabulary.
Biten with the road bike bug, I headed out to my nearest bike store. The sweet tone of a twentysomething female whose body was clearly much harder than mine, this salesgirl/cyclist (one possibly doesn't work in a cycling store for the financial rewards) first asked for my budget when I said, "I'm interested in a new road bike." While I wanted to try them all without being biased by the cost, I thought, I'm a doctor, my car is ten years old, I commute somewhat regularly by bike, I can afford a good bike. "A thousand dollars" I offered.
Soon I was at a second store where I was offered a ride on a sub-twenty pound Spanish hot rod. I flew up the local hill on a test ride, that I used to labor for an hour with each night on the way home. What a pleasure! Only, it cost even more than two thousand dollars.
At the next store, we hung my mountain bike on the scales. It topped 35 pounds. No wonder these road bikes are fun.
We got down to measuring more than my waist and inseam and soon I had a built-for-speed 16.5 pound steed under my legs - for 5000 dollars if I wanted it.
A new car costs much more than that, so this should be money well spent, but it is a lot. Eventually, I knew something about almost every cycling store nearby. Then I surfed Ebay.
I searched and watched prices for about two months. I learned how to bid at the last minute; how to ask probing questions of the seller. Someone nearby (the next state, across the Columbia river) was selling two Italian bikes. I bid and bid and bid. The price on each went up and up. In the end I was the high bidder, but was still under the minimum price he wanted to sell each bike for, so I didn't get either one. The next day I got a call from him and if I wanted one of the bikes, I could have it for the price I bid, since I was within $50 of his minimum price.
I took both bikes. Then, rather than waiting for the delivery, I went to the bank on a Saturday afternoon (you have to understand unbridled boy hood enthusiasm for mechanical toys) and withdrew $2000 dollars in cash. Only the grocery store branch of my bank was open this late on Saturday afternoon. I had to talk to several people to get that much out of my account in a grocery store.
I took off the next morning for Eastern Washington and picked up my new bikes. Rick had the most impeccable two story garage I have seen since those hangers for antique aircraft I visited in my flying days, white glove clean and seven Italian bikes hanging up. The gorgeous red one and yellow ones were soon to be stabled in my garage. Rick custom fit the bikes for me, threw in a pair of cycling shoes and wished me well. His wife couldn't see the need for seven bikes, so he cut it back to five. He had built up all the bikes himself. Seeing their provenance, I smiled and sang to myself the four hours home under the turquoise blue skies of eastern Oregon.
Two bikes obtained for less than half the price of one new. One steel with mellow riding characteristics, one aluminum, light and nimble, both looking like Lamborghini sports cars in my glazed eyes. Fine machines are such a delight! They continue to log miles each week in their new home as I continue to Reduce, Reuse and ReCycle.
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