This blog is supposed to be about new beginnings but already something is coming to an end.
For the last few months I have been cycling to and from work at least two or three days a week. Monday I bussed so I could carry clothes for the week ahead; Friday I bussed so I could avoid sharing a road with the pay day drinkers who forgot they had to drive home while downing a slab of beer at lunchtime.
Perth has more cycle routes than any other Australian city and we are lucky enough to live near one of the best. It takes you across the Causeway over Heirisson Island (where there are allegedly kangaroos living wild; I’ve never seen one) and along Riverside Drive, which skims the Swan River foreshore.
Western Australia is a state that wakes up early so even on leaving the house at 6:40am the cycle path is often busy with not just cyclists, but joggers, rollerbladers and those just out for a stroll. It’s not uncommon to see kayakers or waterskiers on the river at that time, splashing past the cormorants and ducks that sun themselves by the water’s edge.
My commute to the office is only 5.5km, and takes 15-20 minutes, but it has become the most precious part of my day. I arrive at a job I have mostly disliked feeling refreshed (despite having to use the basement car park showers, with their permanent whiff of eau de diesel) and ready to go. I find myself part of a cycling community in a building where any kind of social interaction is rare. Men in tight white lycra ask me about headwinds and compliment me on my choice of pannier. I pretend not to mind when they then overtake me on the route home as I pootle along, enjoying the view.
But Tuesday will be my last day working in the CBD. From April 12 I will be working out in the ‘burbs, in a job that requires me to provide a car at least some of the time. No flexitime will mean an early start may not be realistic – I don’t think they will take kindly to me leaving halfway through the afternoon – so I’ll be sitting in the peak hour traffic with everyone else, listening to people swear on the radio and wishing I was on my bike.
Down under, out west 