| People from places like
Romania and Brazil had relatively little compared with
families from Northern Europe. Whereas families from
the United States were surrounded by an almost obscene
amount of possessions. They were literally exploding
with stuff. Things haven't changed much since that time.
The American mantra is still: Buy. Buy. Buy. Consume.
Consume. Consume.
This mantra manifests itself in how much stuff we acquire
in our lives. Unless you own a house with ample storage
space, or unless you have a load of your stuff stored
at a relatives home, you have to rent yourself a storage
unit to hold all the stuff you can't fit into your teeny
tiny apartment.
We rent a storage unit in the warehouse district of
the city. In this 8-by-10 closet we rest our photo negatives;
construction gear from the warehouse days when we still
had do-it-yourself dreams; empty 10-gallon water jugs
sprinkled in desert dust from Burning
Man; dozens of color-coded steel-pressed rods for
constructing a geodesic dome, also from Burning Man;
plastic bins full of fabric (because I have a strange
fabric-collecting fetish); miscellaneous boxes of memories
(that sounds so sad doesn't it — the idea of a
memory all boxed up), like high school and college yearbooks,
diplomas, old letters and photo albums; and, of course,
our bicycles.
After barely fitting the bikes into the back of our
truck (we apparently need a bike rack — see, a
need for more stuff … always more stuff), we picked
up our trusty bike mechanic friend and went to our apartment
to work on them. As I was yanking the bikes with all
of my strength — since the spokes were stuck and
hey, let's face it, sometimes I have patience issues
— our trusty bike mechanic said, "Woah! Whoa!"
I guess bikes are more fragile contraptions than I'd
realized. Until this past week, I always had used and
abused my two-wheeled friend. I would ride it hard,
and I don’t think I had ever given any of my bikes
a tune-up.
Now I have seen the light. I have learned the basics
of taking care of my bicicletta. I never realized that
just cleaning the frame with a hot rag does wonders
for how a bike runs. It makes sense if you think about
it. All that dirt and grime clog the mechanism from
running as smoothly as it could.
The tricky part is, I don't have a bike mount, so it
would be hard for me to work on my bike without it.
Plus, I do not have all of the necessary tools, but
at least I know how to basically clean my bike now.
After you wipe down every surface with a warm cloth
(except the greasy bits), you want to tighten up all
of the screws; check the gear shifters and the brake
wires; sand down the brake pads; pump up the tires;
then clean and lube the chain. For the chain bit, you
want to take the chain off your bike, then soak it in
warm water with soap to get the extra grime and muck
cleared from it. Once you put the chain back on, do
a final lube and you have yourself a fixed bike. Of
course that's a very simplified explanation of the process,
but at least now I have a better understanding of how
to care for my two-wheeled friend. Since it is rainy
season, I will have to wait to take it out for a spin
(as I am not one to enjoy riding my bike in the rain),
but when the weather clears up, you better believe I
will be taking my new two-wheeled friend (who definitely
needs a name!) out for a ride in this hilly town.
Getting back in touch with my bike has helped bring
to my attention the broader issues of public transportation
in this country. While growing up I rode countless times
up and down Interstate 95 on the East Coast. In recent
years, I have had the pleasure of getting to know the
dynamics of freeway Armageddon, otherwise known as Interstate
5, the freeway that runs from Canada to Mexico, through
Washington, Oregon and California. I have not ridden
on I-95 in a while, but basically on I-5 you are taking
your life into your own hands in a big way as you share
the road with people weaving in and out of traffic;
riding right on your tail, then passing on your right
at 100 mph. Along the straight and narrow stretch of
I-5 that winds its way like an overworked artery through
the central valley of California, you can see a constant
stream of chrome that is muted by the thick haze flowing
in both directions.
Cars=smog=murder to the environment. I admit that I
own and drive a car, so does that make me a willing
murderer, along with all of the other chrome death machines
that travel at suicidal speeds on I-5?
My "favorite" part of the I-5 driving experience
is when the artery of cars is traveling a steady 100
mph in the fast lane, with the truckers and the RVs
in the slow (right) lane, riding a respectable 90; and
all of a sudden for no apparent reason, you see an instant
string of brake lights in front of you. People will
go from 100 to 50 in a flash. You have to be on your
toes on these types of freeways, lest you want to become
a bloody pancake with the car in front of you. My point:
These roads are dangerous to each and every driver on
them and, as we well know, a constant stream of cars
on the freeway is dangerous for the sustainability of
the Earth.
I know this is an outlandish idea that I am about to
propose, but it is one that Europe has caught onto a
long while ago: the building of a high speed train system
in this country. Our nation's present national train
system is practically bankrupt. Amtrak
long has been neglected and is far from high speed.
What about this proposition? It might seem very far-fetched
from our car-based reality, and car manufacturers never
would allow a high-speed train system to become a reality
(for reasons I will get to in a moment). But just for
kicks, allow me the liberty to express this eco-friendly,
civilized solution to this country's transportation
needs.
Imagine a network of three to five high-speed trains
running across the United States. At bare minimum, a
network of trains running 1) East Coast — along
I-95, 2) West Coast — along I-5, 3) Across the
country — alongside I-80. If we wanted to get
fancy and become über-civilized, we could build
a Northern and Southern route across the country as
well, alongside the Northern and Southern cross-country
driving routes.
This imaginary train system of mine would be highly
civilized, like a social outing. It would have regular
passenger cars (coach and first class); sleeper cars;
a restaurant; a movie theater; a smoking car; and, since
this is such a car-dependent society, this imaginary
high-speed rail system would of course have car ports,
where passengers could drive their cars onto the train
at the beginning of their journey and have their cars
travel in a different compartment of the train. Since
we live in such a car-dependent culture, the car ports
on this imaginary high powered rail system would be
essential for its success.
Doesn't that sound like a civilized way to travel?
Not only would you not risk your life on our dangerous
freeways as well as hurt our ailing environment, it
actually could be an enjoyable experience. You could
meet your fellow citizens, watch a movie, rubber neck
out the windows at this beautiful country without risking
your life, catch up on your reading or your sleep, or
just relax.
Alas, sadly, this dream of mine most likely never will
come to be — not unless major structural changes
occur in our culture. Allow me to elaborate. The governing
bodies of this land work dependently and unapologetically
with the auto industry. In fact, we have been fighting
a 10-year war in the Middle East to ensure that the
millions of automobiles in this country get supplied
an endless flow of car food: gasoline. Do we have the
technology to create non-gasoline-dependent, hybrid
vehicles? Of course we do. We could channel the billions
of war dollars into developing alternative forms of
energy and transportation in this country, like hybrid-powered
cars and an efficient national high-speed railway system.
The powers that govern us do not make that a priority,
however, and the auto industry fully supports this choice.
A national high-speed rail system would be competition
for the auto industry, so you better believe car manufacturers
would fight to keep their current market edge on the
mass public.
Let us not forget the ever-present terrorist threat
that ironically prevents us from using the state-of-the-art
technology we invented to improve the flow of our society.
As we recently witnessed in Spain, trains are vulnerable
targets for terrorism. This ensures that my high-speed
fantasy remains just that: an indefinite fantasy.
Sound like screwed-up priorities? They certainly are.
Whenever I take my life into my own hands as I drive
down the chrome river of Armageddon to get to my destination,
I do think of my imaginary über-civilized high-speed
railway system.
There are current initiatives in San Francisco to implement
solar power in places like the Moscone Center, with
the hopes that solar power in this city will be an inspiration
to cities across the nation. Also, driving along I-580
just outside of San Francisco before you reach the valley,
there are rows and rows of mysterious energy-generating
windmills that supply power to God-only-knows-what.
I look forward to the day when we evolve as a species;
when human interest outweighs capitalistic interest;
when we can use our advanced technology to better the
ailing plight of man and the environment by using our
resources more wisely in a more sustainable way, unless
of course we humans are really as self-destructive as
we appear, in which case we will burn up all the gas
of the Earth while riding our chrome death machines
until that magic moment when we push the fatal nuclear
button.
For
an archive of Jessica's columns, visit her archive page
at http://www.rawstory.com/exclusives/martin/.
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