(bikes in Cambridge – www.stockphotopro.com)
Himself and I are pretty passionate about the planet we live on (and I have to be honest here, Himself does all the hard work and research, I just do what I’m told). From what we eat, to where we shop, to where we go on holiday we try our very best to keep our carbon footprints and our plastic bags as minimal as possible.
Except I have one great weakness. My car (Himself doesn’t drive so he can continue to polish his halo). I know, I know. It’s not even a new car, with low pollution, let alone a hybrid or electric car. It’s a 14 year old heaving rustbucket. But I love it. I use all sort of excuses for driving places from “you try carrying 15 yoga blocks around with you on the bus” to “I’ve got fibromyalgia *whine whine*”. Yeah, quite. I really don’t use it that much, there’s just times, like going to work, when it’s just more….convenient.
But really these days I have no excuses. I live in Cambridge, the City of the Bicycle, I no longer need to carry 15 yoga blocks anywhere and honestly, my health is under control.
And then yesterday, a message from the gods. My car went in for a service and came out a write off. The work it needs will cost about twice as much as the car is worth.
I was so upset. Himself worked out how much money I’d spent on the damn car in the last year and I had a minor heart attack. He then pointed out that I could get a lot of taxis/pairs of shoes/glittery eyeliners for that money. I smiled.
So this morning I cycled to work. It’s a 6 mile (about 10km) round trip. The 3 miles to work takes me about 25 minutes at the moment but I’m hoping to get that down to 20 minutes over the next few weeks. It felt good to be cycling, I felt I could be in a much more mindful place on my bike than in my car and oh but how good it felt cycling past the queues of traffic that I usually sit in!
So for now, we’ll see how things go. We’re going up to Yorkshire at the weekend so I will be hiring a car for that. it does mean I will have to cancel the teaching opportunites that I had lined up as I physically will not be able to get to the venue, but everything happens for a reason. Maybe the universe is telling me to focus my energies elsewhere.
I’d like to think I could live without a car. I’m taking it one day at a time.
In the meantime I would like this panier set!
