Not a day goes by, when I don't see someone who wishes me luck on the ride. Sometimes it's other cyclists, going from LA to Jacksonville. Sometimes it's a cashier at a store, or a patron at a restaurant. Today it was a middle-aged man on the ferry who kept telling me hot miserable Texas will be, and how I should be scared of bears in the rockies, and that if he sees one, he'll push me down and run. He then laughed a lot at this, and wished me luck.
But that's not really something special. I'd be doing the same thing if I saw someone biking any distance. Hell, I tell my friends good luck when they drive for three blocks in Toronto. The special moments for me are when others tell me about themselves, and what brought them to this time and place. If I don't watch out, this blog might just end up being "Assaf talks about people he met, posts pictures of them, and pretends it's some deep human connection."
In fact, I was preparing to do just that today. I've got pictures of the guy who, with a small smoker in a wooden hut by the side of the road, sells the best pork you've ever had in your life. I've got pictures of Roxie, the retired woman who spends her life volunteering at national parks. Soon, I might have a picture of Keith and his family, who are occupying the tent site next to mine, and who lent me a lawnchair to sit on the beach and write this blog post to the sound of ocean waves, and the sight of the sun setting over the oil rigs of the Gulf.
But looking forward at myself looking back at myself right now, I'd think that I would have regretted writing so much about people, instead of writing about things. So let's stop that now, and start writing about the things I thought about today.
Today a realization hit me. Something extraordinary, and truly never-before-noticed. Something you've never thought about before, but that will change your life forever once you, too, notice it. Allow me to woke you. This thing is more standardized across the world than electric outlets, more prevalent aloing the road than gas stations, churches. Millions are used every day, and no one even thinks about how amazingly ubiquetus and useful they are.
I'm talking about picnic benches. Think about it, a picnic bench is such a simple construction, that they can be placed anywhere. I've seen them in the middle of the woods, in parks, on beaches, beside restaurants, and even in back yards. They are amazing because they are so simple. Just a few blocks of wood, some screws, and you've got yourself a family picnic spot for decades. They turn empty plots of land, grass, or sand into a place of celebration and comraderie in an environmentally unobtrusive way. They cost next to nothing for the benefit they provide, and so they are everywhere.
I need a place to lean my bike, open bags, make lunch, and lie down, and I instantly know that if there's a boat landing, beach, park, trees, or anything of interest nearby, there will also be a picnic bench, which provides all of my needs for me. For free. And I know that each picnic table is the same. From Florida, to upstate New York, to the beaches of Alabama, to Toronto, to California, to Israel, to anywhere I've been to and probably thousands of places I'll never be in, a picnic table is a picnic table.
I'd be willing to bet that if you saw a picnic table that was 10cm longer than normal, you'd notice it, and know that you're witnessing something special. Even in the US, which uses the God-forsaken trash imperial measurement system knows not to mess with picnic table dimensions.
I want to write a blog that future me would enjoy to read. Today I thought I had a flat tire, but it turned out that my front tire just lost air because the inner-tube valve unscrewed. Today I thought about beaches, and how nice it would be to live on them, in a place that is always warm. I thought about luxury, and how I used to sprun at fancy apartments by the beach, and the flaunting of excess. I used to think that I would never understand how people can enjoy sitting on a beach all day, eating out all the time, and living in a luxury hotel.
At some point, I valued simplicity. I glorified it, and worshipped the idea of living modestly. But somehow, today I understand the appeal. I understand wanting to be rich to get there, and I can see how this is an end-goal for some, regardless of what ideals they need to abandon to get it. I used to never understand how a real estate developer, or a pharmaceutical giant can sleep at night, knowing that their wealth and actions do cause direct harm to others. But now, I can understand why someone would do almost anything for the promise of "you will be comfortable, respected in your circles, and have money for the rest of your life."
It worries me that I can understand this perspective. It makes me think that I will sway towards it as I grow older. Sometimes I wonder if I've already changed in that direction. I stay at hotels, eat out mercilessly, and sit around all day getting paid to pretend to do math. The most important thing I've ever done in my life is teach some linear algebra to someone in computer science, in the hopes that they will be able to do the things I can't.
Isn't that all of what education is for? You give your students as much knowledge as you can in the hopes that they will do what you were not brave enough to try.
Look, I like this format. I like writing, and leaving the images for later. I think I'll do this for a while.
