The reluctant cyclist

What is this thing that prevents me each morning from getting on my bike? My house is a matter of metres from my work, my morals purport to be green and eco and shit, my bike is a pleasingly designed Dutch-bike-reminiscent curvaceous beauty whose gears flip effortlessly as I whir along the suitably maintained tarmac, and it only take seven bloody minutes. But somehow, regardless of what time I manage to drag my reluctant corpse out of bed, I am reliably late every morning and end up making up an errand I need to run so that I have an excuse to drive my little red berry car the short hop up the road.

Instead of my perception of that cycle as an arduous trudge up a shallow but long slope, lactic acid pumping round my leaden legs just in time for a sweaty, red-faced ending (phnah phnah), I need to reimagine the cycle. To think of biking in Oxford as liberating – breezing past beautiful old buildings and people stuck in their cars in traffic. Swooping through the airy streets glowing with spring-morning incandescence and oozing the history of centuries of fellow bikers rolling two-wheeled to their destination, seeking enlightenment and hope. Ahhhhh…

Come on come on come on Parrinder, get off your arse!!