15 Years Apart

On September 18, 2003, Hurricane Isabel made landfall in North Carolina and began making its way north into Virginia and the Washington, D.C. area. In those times, I lived on T Street NW in the District of Columbia. This neighborhood was somewhat more suburban than the area to its south and east in the more developed parts of D.C.

About a month earlier, I had purchased a 20+ speed, modern wonder-bike. It was a Specialized Expedition Deluxe - a handsome bike that I had customized with fenders. This was to be my campus bike for commuting down to college at Georgetown.

When Isabel moved into the area, it caused a great deal of wind and rain. At first, it did not seem like much. My friends and I went out and about at the start of the storm, picking up a few things at the store. Over the course of an evening, the storm steadily worsened. Many of the large, older trees uprooted, falling over onto rowhouses and taking down power lines. These trees raised with them the entire sidewalk, bricks and all.

For about two weeks our area had no electricity after the storm. The only way to get power was to go to campus, only a portion of which had electricity. Each night, I'd ride down to do work where there was light and power, and then return home to go to bed late in the evening. During one of these trips, I found that my bicycle had been stolen from the rack. The thief cut the cable lock and made off with the wonder bike.

Prior to all this, from about 1994 to 2001, I had been in the hobby of restoring old bikes and riding them. These were single speed middleweight and balloon tire bikes of the American style. After losing the modern wonder bike, I decided to get back into old bikes, this time as a means of transportation in college. I bought a 1974 Raleigh Sports for $30.

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So here we are, 15 years - almost to the day - after Isabel wiped out power for two weeks and the wonder bike was stolen; almost 15 years to the day after I bought my 1974 Raleigh Sports. Another hurricane is making landfall in North Carolina and threatening to bring to our area wind and rain. It reminds me how lucky I was to locate and buy this old bike for $30. It has undergone some changes and improvements over the years, but this is a sentimental favorite of mine.

In life, certain things change and certain things hold. Hopefully our luck will be better this time and we will not lose power for two weeks. But then too, hopefully, I am better prepared than in those days. We all try to grow wiser by our mistakes and try to find the better constants in life. $30 well spent.