I recently got the Bike Snob’s book, Bike Snob: Systematically & Mercilessly Realigning the World of Cycling (even the title is wonderfully pretentious) and he writes a truth I’ve always known but never been able to articulate:
“Generally speaking, this stuff [bicycles] is meant to be used. It’s meant to get scratched, dinged, dropped, and even crashed occasionally. A bike should be scratched. Using the bike will bring you joy; preserving the bike will only bring you frustration. Even if you never, ever ride the bike it will still age. So you might as well ride it while it’s pretty and enjoy the process of making it ugly.”
All material things are meant to age, and while some, like fine furniture and paintings, do it gracefully, others like bicycles and work boots are meant to be used and used hard. Being able to see the scars, scrapes, and scuffs on their surfaces is like being able to look inside a great tree and see the layers of rings stretching from the center outward. Each mark is a sign showing that that piece of equipment did what it was intended to do, over and over, bringing joy to the user.
I bought a new pair of skis today. I don’t ski. I’ve been out on cross country skis a handful of times–one long weekend was spent on classic skis in the Boundary Waters, and I spent a few hours on skate skis. Nevertheless, I knew I didn’t want to ride my bike inside for hours on end anymore, so I bit the bullet and bought a pair of entry-level skate skis from the shop. They were beautiful. I spent the morning mounting the binding and prepping the flawless bases for wax, waxing and brushing them to the best of my abilities. Then, I set about making them ugly. I skied as best I could, but spent plenty of time “becoming one with the Earth.” I found the rocks, and I put a few good scrapes into my bases.
Now that I know how to mount bindings and wax skis, I should learn to repair the bases with the plastic sticks we melt into them and refinish their surfaces on the belt tuner and stone grinder. What better way to learn than to practice on my own skis?
I had fun today, and my skis show it. I haven’t stabbed a pole through the top cap yet, but I’m sure I will soon. These skis will stick with me a long time. They’re well-made. They can take it. Early in the season, years from now, they’ll be the skis I pull from the closet and break out in an effort to keep my newest, nicest skis pretty. They’ll be the skis I don’t baby. They’ll be the skis that take on all conditions, that I can count on no matter what, and to them will go the real glory.
People are kind of like bikes and skis, too. When I broke my collarbone it was the first injury I had where I knew I’d have a permanent mark from it. This was discomforting at first, just like the first crash that mars the finish on a new bike, but eventually, after the healing, I saw the bony lump that marks my fused bone as something to be proud of–a fun reminder of someone who pushes it to the limit and isn’t afraid to get hurt. Eventually I’ll collect more marks, lumps, and scars, perhaps even a few wrinkles too, and they’ll only show how well I lived–how my body was something that I used while it was pretty, and I enjoyed every step of the process that made it ugly.
