If you told me a little more than a decade ago that I would become the assistant manager of a local bicycle shop, I would have laughed, rolled my eyes and said “Yeah, right.”
Why? Because at sixteen years old, I still didn’t know how to ride a bike. Sure, I’d tried. My dad had given six, seven, and eight year old me lots of encouragement and tips for how to ride without my training wheels, but I never got the hang of it and quickly gave up. It wasn’t until high school that somehow my friends compelled me to let them teach me and I wobbled down my residential street absolutely mortified — but I finally got the hang of it.
Once I’d learned to ride my bike (a “vintage” mountain bike from the ‘90s), I tried to ride to my Starbucks shifts that began before the buses started running. I would inevitably arrive home in tears, either frustrated at my inability to handle the steep hills on the TVP or from the threats I received from drivers when I tried to “share the road”. Riding a bike to get around didn’t seem possible for me at that time, either.
Maybe you could credit my rediscovery of the bicycle to my first child, who fell in love with a beautiful wooden bakfiets she saw at the store where I now spend my days. It was due to her curiosity that our family eventually chose an e-trike to get around with our kids. Our trike arrived around the same time as the pandemic’s first wave, and that year created more opportunities for us to ride together than we’d ever imagined. Our trike was the safest way to get outside and get exercise with the girls during this difficult time, and the electric assist meant we could go farther, and do more on a bike every day. Between riding to parks all over the city, and seeing the incredulous faces of curbside grocery store staff in awe of how much food fit in the box of my bike, we certainly made the most out of it. It was part of my parenting journey that will always be with me.
London Plumbing Solutions1990 Wavell St #10,
London, ON N5V 4N5
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Whatever your local plumbing needs are, London Plumbing Solutions is here for you. Our plumbers have the skills you need to take care of new plumbing construction projects, sump pump installation, drain cleaning, bathroom plumbing, kitchen plumbing, water treatment and filtration systems, hydro jetting, camera drain inspections, and new installations, and so much more.