Teaching a Teenager to Ride a Bike at Westminster's "Learning Grounds"

Earlier this fall, a family from Buenos Aires came for a visit, and at some point it became known that the son, Mariano, had somehow reached the age of 16 without having learned to ride a bike. Princeton seemed the perfect place to rectify that situation, and so he and I headed over to nearby Westminster Choir College, bike in tow.

It was funny, as we walked towards Westminster on a weekend afternoon, to see kids and adults riding by on their bikes. They suddenly looked like showoffs. One realizes that what we take for granted is really a special skill--a kind of mainstreamed circus act.

Youtube videos on how to teach an adult to ride recommend using a sidewalk or other paved surface, but my preference for passing along this life-transforming skill is a smoothly sloping lawn. My younger daughter learned on this slope at Westminster Choir College, though she had the advantage of being much younger, with less far to fall if things went awry.

Videos offer some basic tips. Set the seat low so they can use their feet like trainer wheels. Have them look ahead, not down, and get comfortable using the brakes to control speed. Don't bother with the pedals until they've gained some stability coasting with legs hanging down to the sides.

I was surprised at how satisfying it is to mentor someone, to pass a life-changing skill from one generation to the next. My role was to offer some pointers, then watch as he would head off down the slope, gaining in balance and confidence each time.

We were on "learning grounds", a special spot overseen by proud Williamson Hall, with beautiful cloud patterns against the glorious evening sky, a half moon, and then the beauty of a bicyclist-in-the-making heading off into the distance, each time more on his own, a metaphor for how the mentored gain independence and ultimately go forth into the world. In this case, Mariano will take this learning with him back to a distant home, to finally join his friends on bike rides in Buenos Aires.

The advantages of learning to ride a bike in Princeton became even more apparent when Mariano had gained sufficient skill to head out on an expedition with his father. We took the big loop that begins with the towpath along the DR Canal, then headed back towards Princeton on the bikepath next to Quaker Road, passing the Updike Farm, Princeton Friends School, the Stonybrook Meeting House,

then stopped at the Princeton Battlefield, where Mariano translated the story of the great victory for his father.

We came next to the backside of the Institute for Advanced Study, with its brainy tradition beginning with Flexner, Veblen and Einstein.

For Mariano, a new world of self-propelled mobility was opening up. For me, it was a chance to pass along the benefits of a sort of mentoring that I received briefly in my youth, on the learning grounds surrounding another great institution--Yerkes Observatory in Wisconsin, longtime home of the University of Chicago's astronomy department. There, a grad student from Canada named Mike Marlboro taught me how to kick a football. It doesn't sound like much, and certainly didn't prove to be the ticket to new worlds, but something in his unrushed manner and tone of voice made me--a little kid among intimidating adults--feel worthwhile. I would watch with amazement at the beautiful spiral and arc of the ball as he made it soar into the sky, and then he'd show me how he did it, with a patience that stretched to the stars. He may have only mentored me a few times, and yet I've felt a lifetime of gratitude for the way he stepped out of his adult world to accept me as I was, and help me along my way.

The ground, I like to think, remembers the learning that happens upon it. Like the Mercer Oak that is said to have witnessed the Battle of Princeton during the Revolutionary War, ground gains in meaning for what it witnesses. As I write this, the future of Westminster Choir College is in jeopardy, and after 120 years the University of Chicago pulled out of Yerkes Observatory, turning that proud learning grounds into what feels now more like a cemetery. A distinguished edifice overlooking expansive green--our lives are aided and ennobled by such places, and I'd like to think future lives will be, too.

Another post about mentoring Mariano, When the Body Teaches the Mind, describes the process of teaching him to chop wood.

Greenfest Transforms Princeton Shopping Center and Embraces the Future

Sunny weather returned to Princeton just long enough to grace Sustainable Princeton's Greenfest this past Saturday, May 11. This was a full scale festival that transformed the Shopping Center's partially sheltered courtyard with so much to learn and enjoy. It was a revelation to see the courtyard's potential as a gathering and learning space being fully utilized, seemingly for the first time.

Though the focus of the festival was on solutions--bicycles, electric vehicles, stewardship--councilman David Cohen challenged passersby to find which disastrous events on his poster were not caused by climate change. Only a couple, as it turned out.

Sustainable Princeton's Jenny Ludmer, one of the chief organizers of the event, showed kids the power of the pedal by having them pedal a bike hooked up to a blender that ground up ice.

My favorite table was organized by girlscout Cadette Troop 72905, which has been so active in helping take care of Herrontown Woods and educating people about its natural and cultural history.

The bike theme began with parking your bike at some new racks purchased to provide Bike Valet service at local events. I had the pleasure of meeting a mother of middle schoolers named Lisa, the master mind behind the middle school recently installing additional bike racks. I had posted in the past about the shortage of bikeracks at the schools and on Nassau Street, but Lisa was able to work effectively through PTO, and even tracked down a good deal on the racks, to ultimately make it happen.

Fest-goers could testdrive electric vehicles of various sorts. A Boston-based electric bike company looking to expand into New Jersey had some very nice electric bikes in the $1-2,000 range. First time I tried one, a few years ago, it felt like cheating to have all that power boost under your feet. The owner said he doesn't hear that said much anymore. Electric is a way to get people back on their bikes. Batteries and electric power are the only way to shrink our sprawled communities back down to a size where we can get around without feeling dependent on carbon fuels. If suburban sprawl has made us feel physically helpless, then turn us into avatars with battery technology.

One of the raffle prizes was an electric scooter--another awesome enabler of transport.

Trash cans were muzzled for the event, with all disposables to be taken to a special tent for separation into recyclables and landfillables.

The courtyard's "green"was dotted with people listening to some fine vocal and instrumental groups. I did a ten minute stint on the stage as Climate Cabaret, taking on the character of CO2, and contrasting sport's celebration of can-do collective action with climate-denial's deep pessimism about taking collective action to slow climate change. I also sought to make up for a global scarcity of environmental jokes. For example:

Question: How many environmentalists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

Answer: Two--one to screw it in, and another to keep turning it off.

Brizo the mermaid was holding court in her own tent, talking to kids about that magical substance we call water.

Sustaining health was another theme at a couple tables, with Isles of Trenton on hand, and a nurse to take the blood pressure of passersby and discuss such topics as Lyme.

This solar suitcase comes with an unfoldable solar array to sustain a house through a power outage, but I ran out of time to find out more. Learning about that will require another Greenfest.

Each day, politically and economically tethered to our roles as dystopia's lackeys, we spew more fossil carbon into the air, unintentionally but knowingly and legally sacrificing the future for the present. A livable  future has been kept bound and gagged by a political opposition warped by pessimism and cowardice.

At Greenfest, all the solutions were on display. It was a chance to once again believe in the future. That old saying, "the sky's the limit," has in recent decades taken on two opposite meanings--one of promise, another of portent. Sustainable Princeton's fabulous festival transformed Princeton Shopping Center for an afternoon. Now, it's a matter of permanently transforming Princeton, of realizing promise, for the sake of the future.

Riding Climate Through Princeton on a Saturday

An environmentally themed Saturday should ideally begin big, with, for instance, the idea of recycling a house. The house in question, brimming with well preserved 2X4s and long spans of 2X8s, is being taken down piece by piece in my neighborhood, which of course I probably wouldn't have noticed if I wasn't the designated dog walker. I introduced myself and asked if they could set aside the wood so that the Friends of Herrontown Woods could use it for refurbishing the historic Veblen house and cottage. Yes, said the contractor. A small cheer rose from my heart. It will take some followup, though, to make sure the workers don't cut all those beautiful old floor joists and rafter braces up into short lengths.

Saturday being the last electronics recycling day of the year, I asked a neighbor if I could take his television along. He had put it out on the curb a couple weeks prior, hoping someone would take it home and use it. I had taken that opportunity to knock on his door, introduce myself as a neighbor, and let him know that it's "illegal" (that's the New Jersey spelling of illegal) to landfill TVs and computers. I doubted anyone would take the TV home to use. More likely, a scavenger would come along, break the back panel and make off with the copper coil--good for a couple dollars at the local scrap yard. By the time electronics recycling day arrived, he had a matching pair of behemoths ready to go, making the pickup truck look like an ark for electronics.

As we pushed them up onto the truck with a dolly (no back-breaking heroics, thank you), I noticed he had an old Mustang in his garage. He bought it in 1965, and it still serves as a backup for his bicycle. He said he bicycles more miles in a month than he drives in a year. Now there's something to aspire to.

The guys at Princeton's Shrredtemberfest (closer than the county's parallel event) were good sports about unloading.

Found two more TVs out on the curb on the way to the bank,

so it was back to Shrrrrrrredtemberrrrrfest so the rejected TVs could join the rest of the old and bloated on a journey to productive deconstruction.

With 300 pounds of TVs delivered for recycling, it was time to repair a folding ping pong table. With the quick tempo of life, and factories glutting the marketplace with merchandise, the art of repair has generally fallen into disrepair. Many people give up on an item at the first sign of defect. Though the ping pong table had been abandoned, it was still in good shape, and needed only a couple screws and some tightening up of the metal frame to be functional again. That's another 250 pounds diverted from the landfill, and a $500 item that can now have a new life.

Later, I was taking my family to the train station when we started seeing bicyclists funneling into Princeton on Washington Rd, like monarch butterflies making a fall migration. They turned out to be 175 strong, part of the annual Climate Ride from New York to Washington, D.C. Back in colonial times, it took two days to ride a horse the 100 miles between New York and Philadelphia. Princeton was conveniently located midway for a stopover. Remnants of the historic inn may still exist in the Gulick House, out towards Kingston.

The Climate Riders (shall we call them the Earth's Angels, with strong hearts instead of leather jackets?) use Princeton the same way, for their first night's stopover. They pitch their tents on the lawn at the YM/WCA, then head to campus for some inspiring lectures. With each speaker receiving cheers, it was one of the more spirited gatherings to talk about climate change, starting with a showing of the short video, The Man Who Lived On His Bike. The leader of the student group Surge made brief remarks, followed by the ride's top fundraiser, who works at the World Bank. She described the projected impact of a 4 degree centigrade rise in temperature this century. "Small number, big problem," was the memorable phrase. She was followed by Deborah Goldberg of EarthJustice, who gave a primer on the many downsides of fracking, lest we think that natural gas is a clean alternative to other fossil fuels.

On the way out, one of the cofounders encouraged me to join the ride next year--flattering, though as a veteran puddle jumper I look upon touring bicyclists as somehow inhabiting another plane of reality, beyond anything I could aspire to. Heading home, with Nassau Street alive with people on a mild fall Saturday evening, I heard a roar coming from the stadium area of campus. It was a bigger roar than the 175 climate riders could muster, with the focus not on carrying civilization and nature safely into the next century, but rather carrying a ball across the goal line.

Have to say, Princeton's offence is impressive. They kept Lehigh on their heals with varied plays, no huddle, and a quarterback who can both throw and run. Princeton scored easily on the series that I watched before departing as the first raindrops began to fall. It was ultimately a losing effort, 28 to 29, but they showed up, played hard, and their skill and spirit made for a thrilling contest. The articles in the paper will tell of the tough loss, the lessons learned, the need to bounce back. In a day, a week, a season, what mattered so much at that moment when the game was won or lost will be forgotten.

Meanwhile, the biggest game of all, the one whose consequences will never be forgotten, is being played every day. It's the fourth quarter, and all the players (that would be all of us, the Climate Tigers?) are still arguing about whether to show up, whether the opponent is really, really real, who will carry the ball, whether victory is even possible. The recyclers made a nice end run around the landfill with all of those TVs. Reusing the wood from the house could be a breakthrough right down the middle, if the contractor agrees to play. The Climate Riders are leading the cheer right down the eastern seaboard.

My now, two days later, the Not So Easy Riders are halfway to D.C., riding 50 to 75 miles a day along country roads. Monarchs, also headed south, can do 30 to 50 miles a day, gliding on favorable winds.

On one level, it's all a game, in the exhilarating sense that there is a goal, an obstruction, victory and defeat. There's the sport of recycling a house, or a TV, of moving a ball down the field or a bike down the road, or of reaching 2100 with a hospitable planet still in our keeping. It's just that the stakes are radically different. Lose a football game, life goes on. Lose a stable climate, life is forever diminished. And yet the loudest cheers are for what matters least. All that passion being spilled on ephemera, day after day. Yes, let's revel in the thrill of a goal line stand. But don't forget that we're players, too, whether we admit it or not, in the highest stakes game any of us will ever play.

I savored the cheers rising from the crowd of Climate Riders, and can only hope they grow.