So I’m snapping $71 worth of groceries in my upcycled ocean-plastic bike basket (#BikesMeanBusiness) onto my handlebars when who should arrive but the mail carrier to empty the large mailbox that shares the space with the bike rack*.
He tells me I need an umbrella. I smile and show him how I’m dressed head-to-toe in rain gear**.
He asks how far I have to ride, in kind of a judgy feel-bad-for-me tone. I reply I get to ride a few miles and it’s lovely**.* I tell him I use my bike for transportation so everywhere that someone in a car would go (70% of all motor vehicle trips are less than 5 miles) is where I go, all year, in all weather.
He says I shouldn’t ride on a day like this (raining steadily but no thunder or lightning), and I’m surprised to get so many negative comments. It’s all I can do to say out loud:
“Et tu, Brute? You’re the frickin’ mailman! If anyone should understand . . . You know, the whole Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds, and all that jazz!”
The same day, I read that a police officer in my city drove drunk and smashed his car into a pole. And again I want to say,
Et tu, Brute? Et tu?
*I was awarded this at that very bike rack about a year ago right now (see bottom of this post for a photo of the statement on the city’s website). The call for nominations for the new recipient has just gone out
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Traveling at the Speed of Bike 