As we get older we seek solace in the past. It’s not that the world becomes confusing; rather, it’s that the world becomes exhausting. I mean, what’s more tedious than watching people younger than you figure out stuff you learned years if not decades ago? Idiots! Whether it’s bikes or anything else, the cycle is the same: take something simple, fuck it up completely, then build a whole subculture around making it “simple” again. The obvious example of this cycle is the entire first decade of the 21st century:
Though it applies to pretty much everything, including of course the return of the hybrid bicycle…sorry, I mean the advent of the revolutionary new flat-bar gravel bike concept:
How silly of me.
Anyway, perhaps this future fatigue is subconsciously what sent me back to my literary archives, where I’ve found great comfort in the words of Henry Miller, as well as the knowledge that he rode a bike with circulation-stopping pant cuff retention and a quill stem long enough to make even Grant Petersen blush:
Indeed, no matter what your age, there is great comfort to be found amid the trappings of yesteryear. Consider this young whipper-snapper:
Unable to find a bicycle light that complemented his mustache, he created his own:
What spirit! When he needed illumination, did he curse the darkness? No! He machined himself a light with all the heavy equipment he just happened to have on hand, and now he rides around solving mysteries:
What’s more, he reconciled the past with the present by making it rechargeable:
I sincerely hope his product succeeds and he can return his full attention to fending off the moths who much follow him around constantly, salivating over his wool wardrobe.
Meanwhile, the future is downright terrifying. Imagine, if you will, a dystopian hellscape in which you must scan your fingerprints in order to access your disc brake-equipped bicycle:
Imagine also the return of the hairnet…
…only you scan it to get “incentives:”
“We also wanted to make the helmet kind of IoT ‘ish. We have embedded in the helmet a highly sophisticated NFC chip, that together with our proprietary software API and if embedded in scooter apps, can make operators create incentives for riding with helmet
I assume the way this works is that if you you’ve exceeded your carbon credit allotment for the month you can’t use the e-assist feature on your bicycle.
Eerie:
Very eerie indeed.