I wasn’t riding a bike just to ride a bike. I was doing it to enter the Church of the Wheel, where supplicants are a happy lot, if you believe the catechists.
The happiest cities all have a high number of cyclists, John Helliwell, a renowned happiness expert and economist at University of British Columbia, explained to me.
Denmark routinely tops the list of the happiest countries in the world. In Copenhagen, one in three people cycles to work or school.
In this country, a survey of more than 6,000 people found that 66 per cent of those who walk or bike to work say they’re very happy with their commute. That compares to only 25 per cent of public transit users and 32 per cent of drivers, according the Statistics Canada report.
I just wish it didn’t feel so suicidal. Cyclist fatalities may be relatively low in Toronto – averaging three per year – but there are 1,200 collisions, the highest percentage by population among major Canadian cities.
“Let me know when you arrive safely,” my partner said sweetly as I set off in the morning. I waved goodbye as if I were headed for an adventure to the Far North, not just to pedal 10 or so blocks to the south. I had ditched the stylish purse and heels. “Take my backpack,” suggested my son, who is visiting from Europe. I put on ugly, warm gloves. I squished a woollen hat on my head. I donned the dreaded puffy coat. He was impressed.
I walked 15 minutes to the nearest Bixi kiosk, the bike-sharing enterprise in Toronto, launched last May. Bixi has 1,000 bikes at 80 stations in the downtown core. I opted for a 72-hour pass, $12 (there are four payment options), thinking I would commute back and forth to work for two days.
“It’s recycling on wheels,” said Dr. Helliwell. “You’re doing something for ... future generations.” The station is solar-powered. The Canadian company started in Montreal in 2009 and is now in Ottawa and London, England.
I felt as virtuous as a dieter who can resist chocolate cake; good and honest as Jack Layton. It would be just me, my legs and two tires among the throng, making my way.
Maybe I could be cool, too. I watched my soon-to-be biker comrades sweep into the station. They jumped off their ride effortlessly. Their bikes were like horses they hitched to a post. Off they strutted to their appointment; latter-day urban cowboys.
I joined the asymmetrical flow of traffic. Other bikers swept past me. We exchanged looks at stop signs, a silent acknowledgment of our purpose and our plight. Cars were schoolyard bullies, and we were the innocents. I remained steady, as a car drove a little too close for comfort. I steered carefully around a stopped bus, wobbling only slightly.
I was trying for a Mary Poppins effect. There is a woman I sometimes see in my neighbourhood, who rides her bike through the traffic down Yonge Street, seated upright in her saddle, wearing a dress and nice shoes, her purse in the basket on the front. Smiling and helmet-less, she is fearless and graceful as a swimmer doing a gentle, steady crawl through a choppy sea. l like what it suggests: that you’re confident, oblivious to the chaos, trusting in others’ goodwill and courtesy, at one with your bike. From the comfort of a car, it looks like an existential statement.
And I had an ulterior motive. Maybe I could achieve a mental void into which a column would write itself. Imogen Heap, an eccentric British singer who wears odd clothes and feathers, ribbons and butterflies in her hair, told me once in an interview that she pedals her bike to and from her recording studio in London as a creative exercise. Lyrics come to her as well as snatches of musical phrases.
