It's like that

As with any shared culture, bikes spawn a lot of metaphors, analogies, similes and cliches.

As a marketer, I am both obsessed with — and tortured by — the need to express some connection between this idea and that, making a witty cross-reference. That sometimes only I get.

That said, you may still appreciate the image of me on my Kona Dew Deluxe, at the bottom of Cariboo Road, looking up. Or at the bottom of NW Marine Drive. Looking up. Or on one end of the Alex Fraser Bridge....you get the idea. 

Five months in, after 45 interviews, 30 studio sittings, and just a sketch of a concept of a book, I'm ready to dig in, gear down and start pedalling. I have a mountain to climb.

Part of the journey is sharing my progress with those in the cycling community who have given me such support, with their time and also their words of encouragement as they tell tales of who did what and when.

Their stories span the course of over 30 years, as they pushed for safer, more accessible, and more equitable streets, communities and cities.

But probably the most satisfying element of capturing these stories is hearing everything else — the personal histories that are sometimes highly relatable, sometimes vastly different from my own, and thus fascinating. The personal philosophies that cover all sides of the political, emotional, intellectual, environmental, spiritual and physical spectrum.

So it's climbing a big hill, but one that's a veritable tapestry of not just random roadside flora, but people and artefacts and events and dramas and so many things that happened in Greater Vancouver in a generation that mattered to mobility.

True mobility, the kind that gets your legs moving and your heart pumping.

I hope you enjoy hearing about it, and I can't wait to finish. I might have a beer at the top.