Fitness Quest

In August, Chad and I moved into a new apartment closer to school. The move was made for a myriad of reasons but my favorite was that I'd no longer have to drive to school. My little Mini has been plagued with problems this past year and not driving promised fewer maintenance headaches in addition to fewer trips to the gas station. I wouldn't have to buy a $300 parking permit at school. Plus, my insurance premiums went down since my car is no longer used for commuting.

But taking the bus turns out to be a pain. The bus stop takes me from the front door of my apartment to the front door of my classroom but waiting for it has consumed hours of my day. Since the bus only runs twice an hour until about 5 pm, missing a bus means bad things for my schedule. Riding the bus is further complicated by the fact that the bus is consistently either 10 minutes early or 15 minutes late.

So plan B was to ride a bike. It sure seemed like a good idea; instead of wasting 1-2 hours a day waiting for the bus, I could ride a bike to and from school and get in shape. After a month of searching for a bike, I found this little blue Ross bike. Dating from the late 60s to early 70s, this is a classic piece of American engineering. Or so I've been told. I liked the bike because it is feminine but not cutesy. It is very small for a small person like me and isn't difficult to use. It has 3 gears that you can switch whether you're moving or not and it's a road bike which means it is perfect for a commuter like me.

Here's a map of my bike route. My apartment is represented by a yellow dot and school by a pink dot. The distance between the two dots is 3.5 miles and is also my bus route. The bus ride is only 10 minutes, but I have to be out waiting for it at least 15 minutes early. It only takes me about 20 minutes to bike to school though so I thought victory was mine.

Unfortunately, there is a small problem with the ride home. See the red dot on the map? That is the last bus stop between school and my apartment. I can ride to the red dot, but it takes most of my energy to do so. The tiniest hill, unnoticed in a car, becomes a mountain on a bike. By this point, I am panting and wheezing and always decide to put myself and my bike on the bus so I can just get home and collapse from exhaustion.

There must be some sort of cruel cosmic joke being played on me because I wait for that bus for 45 minutes to an hour every time, yet it never comes. It should come -- twice -- but not when I am there with my bike. So every single time, I get tired of waiting and decide to continue on the trip home. I don't know why I do this because I know full well what the rest of the trip entails. It's 2 miles straight up a real mountain, not an "it-feels-like-it's-a-mountain" incline. It's such a real mountain that it is only developed on the top, where I live. The rest of it is that green section of the map, a nature preserve.

It takes me almost 1 hour to get to the top of the mountain. After 2 weeks of attempts, I can now ride from the red dot to the green dot but it isn't a pretty sight. Then I push my bike most of the last mile. I don't know if I will ever be able to ride from pink to yellow dot, let alone in less than an hour, but I think this experience has taught me why people train for marathons. I just want to see if I can.