In A Sand Grain

With snowless road shoulders still sandy, yesterday’s ride found 6” clear inside lines. That usually means motorists are violating lanes, though some could just be blowback by passing vehicles. It’ll be months before DPW removes, which saves a lot of time cleaning bikes and primping chains. Wondered what they’ll do with all this tainted detritus. Some looks reusable. Have paid serious money for 75 pound bags; only need to scrape and store for next freeze. Saw several flawless shoals nobody might mind seeing someone sweeping. Also found silver coins lost in snowbanks now receding.

William Blake famously wrote: “To see a World in a Grain of Sand...” The most insignificant things can cause pause for investigations into universal connections. A grain of sand in your shoe may physically irritate. Capitulations to conservative thought irritate learned sensibilities. These whores make a corrupt buck opposing alternatives to today's monetary policy that favors oligarchs. Money is a crucial tool that's wasted on dolts. Corporations only pay 1.9% of GDP in taxes, though some argue that personal taxes have risen to offset. It’s just another wrinkle in that trickle down scheme, a policy failure disproven repeatedly since Reagan begat it in 1980’s. BODs and CEOs never pay their fair share, so middle class earners bear all revenue burden. Bribed legislators exploit suckers with each bill addendum.

Often wonder what to believe. Ludwig Wittgenstein’s On Certainty uses “rider” as an addition or postscript:
607. “A judge might even say, ‘That is the truth - so far as a human being can know it.’ But what would this rider [“Zusatz” = addition] achieve?

624. "’Can you be mistaken about this color's being called green in English? ...‘No’. If I were to say, ‘Yes, for there is always the possibility of delusion,’ that would mean nothing at all. For is that rider [“Nachsatz” = postscript] something unknown to the other? And how is it known to me?”


A comparatively precise language, German for “bicycle rider” is “radfahrer”. Ignorantly trying to mimic Ludwig, Americans demote “a bicycle rider” to an afterthought. Riders are as green as unappreciated leaves, invisible, nothing at all, possibly a delusion, something to ignore or sweep aside, and unknown to stateside traffic planners, though valued by Brits [in this recent official report worth reading] and other Europeans. To Labann it's just a recurrent irritant. For those who say bicycling isn’t as safe as driving, it may be true in specific instances when bicyclists are given no quarter, though overall false, in all 20 times safer considering roads are empty 90% of the time and speeds averaging 12 mph aren’t likely to result in harm unless run over by motorists where shoulders don’t permit cycling.

Terrill Mast, Bike Ride [eam], Bike Ride, self, 2014, was inspired by a dangerous late night spin by bike, which resulted in a fractured arm and a renewed zest for life. “I can never let this be the end. I will do what I can to keep this always on a bike ride outside... I can not tell what is real, check the pulse and I feel... Alive!” Multi-artistic Mast also produced a bike sculpture.