I Do Like Her Like a Biker Like an Icon

Last year for my twenty ninth birthday, my parents, or as I like to call them, Mom and Dad, bought me a Black Specialized Mountain Bicycle with about thirty five gears. It was about the fanciest bike I ever did see, and as I pedaled past the neighbors I could hear their coos of admiration, their squeals of delight.

This summer, that bike sat in my hall closet, gathered a bit of dust and lost the air in its tires (there is a metaphor, a life lesson in there somewhere, but I'm too damn tired to think of it at this point). It wasn't until these past couple of weeks that I finally got out the bike and did some riding. They say you never forgot how, you know.

Bike riding is good exercise. It's a nice way to see the neighborhood's scenic sights. It can be soothing, it can be exhilarating, it can be just plain fun. Or it can be just another hour spent spinning one's wheels. As a child, countless summer days were spent under the blue light skies racing up and down the streets of Roseville. I would pretend my Blue Schwinn with its embarrassing curly que handlebars and banana seat was a horse. The fields of Kentucky stretched in front of me and I was either Gary Cooper or Willie Shoemaker depending on the day, with the excited sound of announcers calling the last leg of the critical race. Some days I would win, some days my horse or myself would have an off day and we would finish a disappointing nose behind the leader. It was the Tour de France on a Tour de Force horse, mixing genres, making no sense but having one hell of a fun time doing it anyway, day after day.

These days all I'm riding is a bike. It's not exactly an original observation but somewhere over time, the imagination of a dreamer is replaced by memories, by experience and it gets harder and harder to pretend. Some close their eyes to see; some do their best thinking when others are talking; some just get through, chore by chore. My friend suggested I pretend the bike is a spaceship or a race car, but I can't seem to stop the cynicism long enough to do so. Oh well, creativity ain't exactly bread and water, we don't need it to survive.

But we may need it to stay in business. Have you ever noticed how a shopping experience can absolutely be made by a unique atmosphere? Or how much a sales clerk who shows just a glimmer of innovation can truly be admired because such people are so rare to find these days? Creativity is a virtue, one to be treasured and actively sought.

With the recent salmonella scare from Schwann's ice cream, a memory (believe me, not a figment of my imagination) came to mind of my favorite local newscast report. KSTP, Channel 5 used to have an anchorman named Randall Carlisle. Mr. Carlisle used to like to start his newscast's lead story with a question. It is a technique they teach you to avoid in journalism school (say a story about hot air ballooning, it would be a cliché and an ugly sight to say, "How many of you have ever wanted to ride a hot air balloon?") yet it is fairly common to see in the medium of broadcast journalism.

Anyway, a few years back there was an outbreak of food poisoning that the experts pinned down to bad cheese. Mr. Carlisle thus began the newscast: "How many of us have enjoyed cheese?" To go against what they teach you, in many schools is defined as some sort of creativity. To do so in the extreme, without thinking of the end result, is often called a bad mistake.

A baseball card in the spokes, a revealing interview with a mother cow might be a method to capture your desire's attention. Risk taking is aptly named because often, a lot of effort doesn't pay off. But it really never hurts to try, and the benefits are more often than not, as valuable as the difference between a bike and a bike like horse. In other words, in a memory a creative spark can be born. Left brain, right brain, sometimes it is best to utilize it all, sometimes it's better to shut it all down. The secret comes in learning the timing, the right moment to tap in on one's unique resources. Imagination edited by critical thinking, realism enhanced by spontaneity, both can be useful approaches if the balanced, beneficial mixture can be found.

NEXT WEEK: A SPECIAL ON SIGHT REPORT FROM OUT STATE MINNESOTA, ALL THE WAY FROM LOVELY ALEXANDRIA!