My Awesome New Bike

Thanks to Matt, my bike is up and running. I will have to get some pictures posted, so that you can appreciate the full awesomeness of my Windsor Tourist. Compared to all other bikes I have owned, it is quite fast. I am still trying to get the hang of shifting on these outrageous Pittsburgh hills, and I'm a little touch and go on the toe clips. I have often said that my preferred method of transportation is a pied, however this works best if you have infinite time to get where you are going. Since we live in the city, biking is nearly as fast as errands in the car, and I am completely amazed and enthralled by this.

I have done only short rides so far, as the weather turned particularly nasty this weekend. Living indoors has caused me to be more discriminating about when I will go out. Freezing rain is not that appealing to me, especially since I am battling a cold.

Instead, Rosie the Cat and I are hanging out in the sitting room listening to records and reading. I did remarkably little reading during the past year on all our travels. Books just seemed heavy and bulky and hard to obtain, and I spent more time listening to the forest fall asleep than I did reading in the evenings. Now that I have reliable electric lighting, I have begun my weekly pilgrimage to the Carnegie Library once again. This week, I am reading Courage for the Earth: Writers, Scientists, and Activists Celebrate the Life and Writing of Rachel Carson. Of course, Rachel Carson is best known for her work exposing the dangers of DDT in Silent Spring. However, what struck me most about this collection of essays on her life and work was her interdisciplinary approach, and the impact it had on the contributors to this collection.

An avid reader and writer since childhood, Carson did not abandon her love of the written word when her work turned towards ecology. Instead, she was diligent about delivering her scientific observations in a carefully constructed prose, with obvious detail to word choice and voice.

To quote our favorite movie, my thinking about this subject has been very uptight.

I have looking at my writing as something that occurs in a vacuum. I can be a teacher. Or I can be a writer. Since starting my teaching job, I've definitely caught myself thinking...oh, I guess I'll just start writing next year. I need to turn that around.

It's not just a matter of making sure I take time every day to write. I can use all of my writing opportunities in my daily life to work on my style. I will use eloquent language in my lesson plans, incorporate deliciously descriptive words in my instructions to my students, and choose my phrasing carefully in emails!

In addition, I do need to take some time to work on my book. I did a few paragraphs today, writing about Mt. Moosilauke, the first of New Hampshire's 4,000 footers that we climbed. Unfortunately, I am deep in the throes of hiker withdrawal, and thinking about the AT makes me feel very sad that I am not ON the AT. Lots of people warned me about this, but I didn't take it very seriously as I was not one of those thru-hikers who wanted to be a thru-hiker forever. I spent a lot of time feeling rather terrified and unsure of myself. Now, all I want to do is another thru-hike.