Today I feel like an excited 10-year-old. After two years of deliberation, I have ordered myself a brand-new bike! I can’t wait to collect it and have a go.
Of course, in times of COVID and with restrictions in place, I haven’t actually test-ridden any e-bike. This may be fool hardy, but today I don’t care. I am relishing this feeling, counting down the days and nearly bursting with pent up anticipation. I want to tell everyone I meet, which means my family have borne the brunt of it as I don’t think my work colleagues will be even vaguely interested.
I have ambitions of sailing around my neighbourhood, getting used to the controls and the push of assistance up the hills. From there I will cycle around the town we have lived in for 2 years that I hardly know, and become familiar with the routes to parks, shops and local landmarks, shortcuts across town and routes to neighbouring towns and villages, all the while becoming fitter and leaner. I fully intend to morph into a wiry and resilient older woman. I will cycle to the local market to buy fresh fruit and veg, use it to get to dental and optician appointments and hop on to pop to the local shop to pick up a loaf or some milk when we run out (when I finally feel it’s safe to do so with COVID of course).
I now find myself in the strange position of owning a bike that is worth three times the value of my car. It was P that pointed this out to me, despite the bike being at the lowest end of the e-bike market cost-wise, which says a lot about my car! I have struggled to justify spending the money on such a venture for two years, all the while watching the cost of them nudging up month by month as I dithered. The demand for bikes over lockdown, especially e-bikes, has been phenomenal and the price has mirrored that. So, what with the push from the Government to ban the sale of petrol vehicles in the near future, coupled with my wish to reduce my petrol mileage and get fitter, I have finally done it. The hesitation in the bike shop this morning was so strong that when I finally told the assistant I wanted to buy it the sensation was, just for a second, like stepping off a cliff into freefall and it took my breath away. How am I going to wait this out until the bike arrives and is built for me? By working a twelve-and-a-half-hour night shift, eat, sleep, and repeat until the weekend.