Road Cycling · Public discussion

The old becomes new again

Claire Petersky · 2003-06-16T01:00:25+00:00

We were going to buy a new bike for my older daughter, Rose. She's growing like a bamboo shoot, over 5' now, and her old K2 Zed no longer fit her. Meanwhile, her younger sister Emma was lusting for the Zed's 27 gears and hot pink paint job. Rose needed a new bike so we could do summer time bike rides as a family and if Emma had gears, we could do much more interesting rides than if every ride had to be flat. We took a trip to the bike shop. It became clear that Rose would fit an adult frame now. We explained what we wanted to the bike shop guy: "all-rounder", "hard tail", "sturdy", "steady" and as we gave him all the attributes, it became clear we already had the bike we were describing. We thanked the guy and split, and went home. There it was, hanging from a hook on the ceiling in the garage. My beater bike. Some of you might remember my story about this bike from a posting here (http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=HEd_6.4- 7%24th.6705%40newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain) or (http://tinyurl.com/edzr). We felt embarrassed to think we hadn't thought of it before. We took it off the hook, took off the SPDs (now on the tandem! yay!) and put on the flat pedals, took down the seat, and made a few other adjustments. She got on it. Y'know, it wasn't too big. I reviewed the thumb shifters. Rose was unhappy that the gears weren't numbered like her old bike, and seemed somewhat perturbed when I said I knew what gear I was in by feel and by looking down at my feet. She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of them together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying to get used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on my old yellow Hard Rock. Oh! Warm Regards, Claire Petersky ([email hidden]) Home of the meditative cyclist: http://home.earthlink.net/~cpetersky/Welcome.htm Singing with you at: http://www.tiferet.net/ Books just wanna be FREE! See what I mean at: http://bookcrossing.com/friend/Cpetersky

Started by Claire Petersky · 16 June 2003 · Last activity 18 June 2003 · 6 posts · 702 views

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01 / Original postThe old becomes new againClaire Petersky · 16 Jun 2003 02 / This pagePosts 1–6Page 1 of 1 · chronological order 03 / Latest replyPost #6Van Bagnol · 18 Jun 2003

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Original section: Road Cycling
Published: 16 June 2003
Last activity: 18 June 2003
Original author: Claire Petersky
Posts: 6
Discussion status: Public discussion
Total views: 702
Views / 30 days: 0
Topics: Pedal choice

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Original post
Claire Petersky
Archived post

16 June 2003, 01:00 UTC #1

We were going to buy a new bike for my older daughter, Rose. She's growing like a bamboo shoot,
over 5' now, and her old K2 Zed no longer fit her. Meanwhile, her younger sister Emma was lusting
for the Zed's 27 gears and hot pink paint job. Rose needed a new bike so we could do summer time
bike rides as a family and if Emma had gears, we could do much more interesting rides than if every
ride had to be flat.
We took a trip to the bike shop. It became clear that Rose would fit an adult frame now. We
explained what we wanted to the bike shop guy: "all-rounder", "hard tail", "sturdy", "steady" and as
we gave him all the attributes, it became clear we already had the bike we were describing. We
thanked the guy and split, and went home.
There it was, hanging from a hook on the ceiling in the garage. My beater bike. Some of you might
remember my story about this bike from a posting here (groups.google.comgroups
7%24th.6705%40newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain) or (tinyurl.comedzr).
We felt embarrassed to think we hadn't thought of it before. We took it off the hook, took off the
SPDs (now on the tandem! yay!) and put on the flat pedals, took down the seat, and made a few other
adjustments. She got on it. Y'know, it wasn't too big.
I reviewed the thumb shifters. Rose was unhappy that the gears weren't numbered like her old
bike, and seemed somewhat perturbed when I said I knew what gear I was in by feel and by looking
down at my feet.
She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of them
together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying to get
used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on my old
yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
Warm Regards,
Claire Petersky ([email hidden]) Home of the meditative cyclist:
home.earthlink.netWelcome.htm Singing with you at: tiferet.nettiferet.net Books
just wanna be FREE! See what I mean at: bookcrossing.comCpetersky

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Gary Smiley
Archived post

16 June 2003, 01:30 UTC #2

--------------0F0A221E7705008607DE0C9C Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Claire- For very little money you could install grip-shifters, and once again the gears would
be numbered.
- Gary
Claire Petersky said:
We were going to buy a new bike for my older daughter, Rose. She's growing like a bamboo shoot,
over 5' now, and her old K2 Zed no longer fit her. Meanwhile, her younger sister Emma was lusting
for the Zed's 27 gears and hot pink paint job. Rose needed a new bike so we could do summer time
bike rides as a family and if Emma had gears, we could do much more interesting rides than if
every ride had to be flat.
We took a trip to the bike shop. It became clear that Rose would fit an adult frame now. We
explained what we wanted to the bike shop guy: "all-rounder", "hard tail", "sturdy", "steady" and
as we gave him all the attributes, it became clear we already had the bike we were describing. We
thanked the guy and split, and went home.
There it was, hanging from a hook on the ceiling in the garage. My beater bike. Some of you might
remember my story about this bike from a posting here (groups.google.comgroups
.47%24th.6705%40newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain) or
(tinyurl.comedzr). We felt embarrassed to think we hadn't thought of it before. We took it
off the hook, took off the SPDs (now on the tandem! yay!) and put on the flat pedals, took down
the seat, and made a few other adjustments. She got on it. Y'know, it wasn't too big.
I reviewed the thumb shifters. Rose was unhappy that the gears weren't numbered like her old bike,
and seemed somewhat perturbed when I said I knew what gear I was in by feel and by looking down at
my feet.
She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of them
together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying to
get used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on my
old yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
Warm Regards,
Claire Petersky ([email hidden]) Home of the meditative cyclist:
home.earthlink.netWelcome.htm Singing with you at: tiferet.nettiferet.net
Books just wanna be FREE! See what I mean at: bookcrossing.comCpetersky
--------------0F0A221E7705008607DE0C9C Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> Claire- For very little
money you could install grip-shifters, and once again the gears would be numbered. - Gary
Claire Petersky wrote: <blockquote TYPE=CITE>We were going to buy a new bike for my older
daughter, Rose. She's growing like a bamboo shoot, over 5' now, and her old K2 Zed no longer
 fit her. Meanwhile, her younger sister Emma was lusting for the Zed's 27 gears and hot
pink paint job. Rose needed a new bike so we could do summer time bike rides as a family and
if Emma had gears, we could do much more interesting rides than if every ride had to be flat.
<q>We took a trip to the bike shop. It became clear that Rose would fit an adult frame now. We
explained what we wanted to the bike shop guy: "all-rounder", "hard tail", "sturdy", "steady"
and as we gave him all the attributes, it became clear we already had the bike we were
 describing. We thanked the guy and split, and went home.
<r>There it was, hanging from a hook on the ceiling in the garage. My beater bike. Some of you
might remember my story about this bike from a posting here (<a href="groups.google.c-groups.google.c-
om/groups?selm=HEd_6.47%24th.6705%40newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain">htt-
p://groups.google.com/groups?selm=HEd_6.47%24th.6705%40newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net&oe=U-
TF-8&output=gplain</a>😉 or (<a
href="tinyurl.comedzr">tinyurl.comedzr</a>😉. We felt embarrassed to think we
hadn't thought of it before. We took it off the hook, took off the SPDs (now on the
tandem! yay!) and put on the flat pedals, took down the seat, and made a few other
adjustments. She got on it. Y'know, it wasn't too big.
<s>I reviewed the thumb shifters. Rose was unhappy that the gears weren't numbered like her old
bike, and seemed somewhat perturbed when I said I knew what gear I was in by feel and by
looking down at my feet.
<t>She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of
them together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters,
trying to get used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such
 *naches*. My baby on my old yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
Warm Regards,
<v>Claire Petersky ([email hidden]) Home of the meditative cyclist: <a href="ho-ho-
me.earthlink.net/~cpetersky/Welcome.htm">home.earthlink.netWelcome.htm</a>
 Singing with you at: <a href="tiferet.nettiferet.net">tiferet.nettiferet.net</a> Books
just wanna be FREE! See what I mean at: <a href="bookcrossing.comCpetersky">h-
ttp://bookcrossing.com/friend/Cpetersky</a></blockquote> </html>
--------------0F0A221E7705008607DE0C9C--

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Zoot Katz
Archived post

16 June 2003, 08:30 UTC #3

15 Jun 2003 17:15:33 -0700,
Quoted post said:
She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of them
together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying to get
used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on my old
yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
Warm Regards,
With some care and luck, you'll be getting the bike back from a grand-daughter when she's
finished with it.
--
zk

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Peter Cole
Archived post

16 June 2003, 12:30 UTC #4

"Claire Petersky" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:
We were going to buy a new bike for my older daughter, Rose.
She pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of them
together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying to
get used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on my
old yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
My 14 yo son has been riding around on my wife's old bike (complete with 1974 U Mass registration
sticker). We had some fun this winter modifying it with straight bars and gripshifts for him to use
as a beater.

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Pbwalther
Archived post

16 June 2003, 14:00 UTC #5

Wonderful story Claire and wonderful writing.

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Van Bagnol
Archived post

18 June 2003, 03:30 UTC #6

In article <[email hidden]>, [email hidden] (Claire
Petersky) said:
We were going to buy a new bike for my older daughter, Rose. She's growing like a bamboo shoot,
over 5' now, and her old K2 Zed no longer fit her. Meanwhile, her younger sister Emma was lusting
for the Zed's 27 gears and hot pink paint job.

[...]
Quoted message said:
[Rose] pushed off anyway. There she was -- and there it was, my old beloved beater -- the two of
them together. She rode to the end of the street and back, carefully working the shifters, trying
to get used to the bigger size of the bike. Meanwhile, I was filled with such *naches*. My baby on
my old yellow Hard Rock. Oh!
I get a thrill a little like that when my kids outgrow their bikes and start riding the next one
handed down. So do they -- my daughter learning gears on her brother's old bike, and my son's
rediscovered enthusiasm on a new one. On the next jump he'll inherit his mother's bike and she'll
inherit his brother's hardtail. After that, he'll get my Rockhopper, she'll get Mom's Hardrock and
I'll have reason to shop for a new full-suspension MTB for myself! :-)
Van
--
Van Bagnol / v a n at wco dot com / c r l at bagnol dot com ...enjoys - Theatre / Windsurfing /
Skydiving / Mountain Biking ...feels - "Parang lumalakad ako sa loob ng paniginip" ...thinks - "An
Error is Not a Mistake ... Unless You Refuse to Correct It"

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