The Hardest Button to Button
I can’t tell you what the hardest button to button is, the first or the last. Yet I am standing there, trying to put an ever-so-Mr.-Rogers-esque cardigan on someone who is really more Levi’s jean jacket with the cut-out concert t-shirt sewn on the back, and the seams purposely frayed. Sure, the sweater fits, but both of us know, about 6 layers below the “good intention” strata of social interaction, that it’s not gonna to work. But somehow, I’m buttoning up the front of that cardigan, smiling, figuring it’s gonna work.
You do the same thing. You know you do. It’s like buying your significant other/spouse/family member/best friend/coworker clothing for a holiday gift. They’d sooner be seen wearing a ballet leotard in the arctic than donning what you’ve chosen. No matter what the label says, one size may fit all, but fitting, and fitting are two completely different things.
It’s riding. And it happens. Someone, probably someone you know and respect, or like, or generally tolerate, or someone you have to work with, asks you about riding to work, or riding in general. There you are, post-commute coitus, and smelling a little like a tube sock left in the back of a locker. You’re floating, the world is happy and you’ve no complaints. Even work seems like a good idea. And then it happens, you get one of the standard questions: Is it hard? How far do you have to ride? Isn’t it dangerous? And perhaps the most bating, loaded statement ever: I have a bike I used to ride…
Is it hard? Why no, it’s not. Never mind getting up an hour earlier than they’d think about being conscious, the possibility that there are multiple showers in one day, or the maybe the fact that you get a little sweaty and don’t shower. Forget the battle of the hill, the headwind, or the day of hitting every one of the 39 red lights on the way in. Disregard the morning you get three flats, going through your two tubes and that your patch kit is, in some mysterious way, missing the tube of glue.
How far do you ride? Oh, not far, it’s like a short distance. A distance that has no concept to a person who drives a car and measures distances in time between A and B, with the measure being the amount of traffic at metered lights, on-ramps, or rubber necking some accident. Sure, it’s a short distance to that person you know gets winded walking up a flight of stairs, or for whom the back row of parking is pretty close to an ultra marathon. Even with your “fit” friends, you’re calling it a short distance with the person who has the patience of a three-year-old child on double espresso, and that anything longer than five minutes has them into near cardiac arrest over “how long it’s taking”, the kind of person who has trouble waiting for super glue to dry.
Isn’t it dangerous? Your brain syncs up with a wireless connection, statistics upload and spew from your mouth like a supercomputer. You’re flailing wildly about lane positioning and proper lighting. Something about “salmoning” comes out, and the fact you’ve never, ever been hit. Never mind the innumerable times you’ve been buzzed by someone in a heavy duty pickup with mirrors that stick out farther than the ears from the tech guy in accounting.
Pass up the opportunity to talk about how you nearly impaled yourself on the handlebar stem when making an emergency stop on Broadway near 4th when the driver of the green cab suddenly decided to go from the left lane all the way to the right, and then turn right in a physics-defying distance of three feet, right in front of you. Also, even though it is a sin of omission, leave out the time you gave the plumbing van driver the finger when they honked at you for being in the bike lane, and they decided to get out and give chase with a pipe wrench. You were faster than ass-crack man in tight-fitting jeans anyway. And, AND, leave out your constant battles with the 7A Bus on University. No, it’s not dangerous, not at all.
And then, the most worst of all: “I have a bike in the garage”. Mental gears start spinning, and before common sense kicks in, you say: “I can help fix it”. So, the Christmas gift, seventy-dollar special from the big box store that still has nubbies on the tires, and despite being packed in the garage, still in the box, has rusted in seventeen different places, ends up in the back of your car to be taken home and fixed by you in vain hopes of making another commuter.
You’ll spend several hours trying to figure out if the stain on the bottom bracket is leaking lube or rat urine (it’s both), wondering how anyone in Taiwan could bolt on a seat post THAT tight (machines, or lasers, not sure which), marveling at a cup and cone hub that can not be set right in 2 hours (it’s not you, it’s the bike), looking for three missing ball bearings that must have rolled from the dry-as-a-bone front hub (they were actually never there), replacing brake cables that might have actually been made from string, and finally paying your best friend bike mechanic an extra twenty dollars for truing the wheels while you wait. This last one, as they look at you like you’ve lost all sanity.
You’ll throw your back out trying to lift the seventy-pound behemoth out of the back of your car, forfeiting a day of commuting, and fork it over, registering the disappointment that they don’t see any difference between when you got it and when you returned it. And you’ll smile, knowing in your heart of hearts that it will see one weekend ride and then rust away again in the corner of the garage with the Christmas decorations. It will also become a temporarily awkward topic as you ask when they will be riding in.
All good intentions aside, there you are putting a cardigan on the person who would not ever, ever wear a cardigan. And starting with the first button, or trying to finish the last, you’re wondering which is the hardest. It’s not them, it’s you. Really. All your good experiences, all the benefits, all the green reasons, all the happiness, it’s yours, not theirs. Kind of like when a toddler finally goes number two in the toilet instead of their pull-ups. Proud as ALL get out, they want to show you a brown floaty in the toilet that they did. They are proud, and all you want to do is flush the damn thing.
When you try to sell the idea, you’re really shoving a pill the size of a doorknob down the throat of someone who probably could really use it. And you both know it’s not gonna happen until they can take that leap of faith on their own. Not at all. No amount of convincing, storytelling, or fact-spewing is going to do it.
I realized this as I locked up my bike on the first day back after a while. Someone I had seen a few times, talked to casually, was locking up their bike. It was a bit of a shock, both at seeing another commuter where I work, but more so from having seen them often and never having been approached. We made general chit chat, and finally, broaching that distance between, they said, “I saw you riding all the time, and it looked like you enjoyed it, so I wanted to try it. And it is fun.”. Then of course, we’re sharing cardigan stories and buttoning buttons. Figuratively of course, cardigans aren’t my thing. It turns out the hardest button to button is the one they do themselves.