Biking Ain’t No Breeze, Please: January in MN
Cold redefines itself as January in Minnesota. Five degrees in the sun feels warm; negative five in the dark is bitter. The surface of metal bites back. Lifting a bike with bare hands in the deep cold of January is the equivalent opposite of touching the hood of a car in the sunny, soporific heat of August. Metal burns at both extremes. Our skin has yet to evolve to withstand the intensity of either. Put on your mittens, this is not a joke.
Cutting corners doesn’t cut it. Two weeks ago I thought I would rough it, running late for work, couldn’t find my dork hat, wrapped my scarf around my face and took off. Bitter cold on the bike. The cold first stings and then numbs. Ten minutes later I was indoors. Twenty minutes later, the redness didn’t fade. Just like that. Frostbite on the forehead. Never, ever again. Lesson learned, elements. I will forever respect you. Hat hair is a million times more respectable than frostbite on the face. Be five minutes late. Take it slow. Find the appropriate gear. Nerd it out.
But Minnesotans, ultimately, are nice. They know it’s miserable out there. They know their heated cars are humanity’s greatest gift to humanity. They’ve even got automatic start buttons, to start the car from the comfort of the office, and they’re more than willing to show it off. To share that joy. They’ll lend you a ride, and you won’t even have to sit on a cold seat. The thought of you on a bike makes them miserable. It’s snowy out there, for gosh’ sake! They’ve got butt warmers. There’s heat blasting from the dashboard, blasting over your toes. From the inside of a heated car, the bitter cold is temporarily staved off. A carefully engineered body-enveloping shield. Climb on in!
So I’ve survived nearly half of January. And this weekend, a heat wave, two degrees above freezing! But with the bitter cold there is at least the sun, and the sun is a glorious reminder that somewhere beyond this cold, life still exists. We’re still rotating around the sun, we’re still spinning in orbit, we’re still part of some cycle that will bring us through to tolerable temperatures, Hawaiian shirts, barbecues out on the lawn. Fresh fruit, orange juice. Spittin’ watermelon seeds.