When you (temporarily) have a car and totally don’t want it

One of the biggest reasons I ever even entertain the notion of wanting a car is to go on adventures — to get further away from Portland in a weekend, say, than I can using only my bike or my bike + transit.

Or sometimes I think a car would be nice so I could go running in places that are harder to get to than nearby Mt Tabor. With enough time, I’ll bike to Forest Park or sometimes Tryon Creek State Park to run — but either of those take me at least 40 one-way minutes of biking to get to, so I need to be able to dedicate a fairly sizeable chunk of the day to it.

Tryon Creek State Park(though Tryon Creek is so wonderfully hilly AND gloriously muddy right now:)

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In a funny turn of events, James and I have had a car at our house and available for our use since Thursday night. And you know what? It turns out that once it’s here, I totally don’t want to use it anyway. It turns out that a car is sometimes desirable in theory, but hardly ever in practice.

Since Thursday night, this four-wheeled driving machine has sat in front of our house, keys untouched by the door. No way did I want it to get to work on Friday: even though it’s far, I love my bike commute. No way did James take it to get to a far-away Saturday obligation. And when I got up this morning thinking “hey! It’s my chance to run at Tryon Creek without spending the whole morning doing so,” it turned out that I’d rather get on my bike and go to Mt Tabor anyway.

I’m not sure where along the line this happened, but I really just don’t like being in cars that much. Even when they’re right here in front of me available to use.  Compared to pedaling my bicycle through the world, sitting in a car seems stifling, something to be done only very rarely when other friends and long-distance travel is involved.

I’m pretty happy with that. And my run at Mt Tabor was fantastic, as was my bike ride to get there:)

2 Comments:

  1. I always hated cars when I was little. C’est génétique. :-)

    • heh. Or else it’s an objective truth (totally objective!!;) that cars, though serving a purpose sometimes, are just not that fun once you’re used to moving by your own power;)

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