I can’t ride a bike.
I have gone 19 fulfilling years without ever sitting on those painfully uncomfortable seats and pedaling my little legs off. I mean, why would I? I have a driver’s license (that I admittedly did earn a year late) and two fully-functioning legs (though I am known for my chronic knee problems).
For most of my life, I could not imagine a world in which I would ever need to learn this basic skill. Then I moved to Georgetown.
After a year of walking to the monuments, Trader Joe’s, and tackling the longest ever recorded distance traveled by foot—Arrupe Hall to Car Barn—I’m starting to think there might be a point in biking. So I’m giving it a try.
When I was a kid, my younger brother and I did have some pretty gnarly bikes (mine was Barbie, and his was… orange. Boy-themed, I guess?). My dad tried to teach us, with a 50/50 success rate.
I’m pretty easily frustrated, and I hated it when my brother beat me at anything. So when he got his training wheels off, I gave up my Barbie bike and vowed to never learn.
Until this week.
Now, when I confess that I can’t ride a bike, suddenly everyone turns into Lance Armstrong (Editor’s note: Aubrey originally wrote Neil Armstrong, an error perfectly showcasing her lack of biking knowledge). “Let me teach you! Let me teach you!” my classmates chant, begging to hold the seat and push me towards victory. I adamantly refused until Voice social media editor Phoebe Nash offered.
Phoebe and I have been through it all. From organizing one-of-a-kind soirées to spending three months trying to define “metanarrative,” and even holding up a large poster board reading “SEX!” in the middle of Red Square (for the Voice, per usual), you could say we’re trauma-bonded. When Phoebe excitedly offered to teach me, I agreed.
This week, Phoebe and I made our way to the Capital Bikeshare rack to pick up my new ride. Accompanied by proud Capital Bikes membership holder and Voice features editor Chih-Rong Kuo, we were off to start practicing. My goal? Three pedals, solo.
As any normal and sane person would, I first asked my peers for tips. Advice included going downhill, learning the brakes early, and having confidence. The most inspiring came from someone in the newsroom, who told me that I am the bike.
“It comes down to you,” a colleague said. “You can’t give up.”
Therefore, I approached this journey with entirely too much confidence. Working on a rolled ankle and a dream, I was off to the races for roughly two seconds.
My first biggest issue, shockingly, was the element I felt best about: balancing. As a semi-competitive dancer and cheerleader, I was pretty confident I could balance.
“Do I have scoliosis?” I asked Chih, who pointed out my incredibly askew hips on the seat.
Phoebe suggested I overcorrect, which produced mixed results. Time after time, I fell to the side. I even failed to balance the bike enough to get off, leaving me on the ground in my bike-dug grave.
After some practice, simply sitting on the bike and a few more attempts on the sidewalk, we moved to a surprisingly busy back alley. With the helping hands of Phoebe and Chih, I made some movement forward and had some very basic gliding down.
Eventually, the advice I had been hoping to ignore was too obvious. I had to “just go for it.”
As it turns out, I’m not very good at going for it. I’m a nervous person and am constantly worried about injury (take a guess on why I’m no longer a cheerleader). With Phoebe’s undying support, however, I was starting to secure at least one pedal solo.
After hitting a mental block following some pretty rough attempts, I decided to phone the man who knows my bike-related failures the best: my dad.
My dad was not fazed by his 19-year-old daughter calling him at 6 p.m. on a Monday about her inability to ride a bike. He offered some valuable tips.
“You just gotta keep pedaling,” he said, as though I hadn’t been attempting this for the last thirty minutes (in his defense, he knows my weaknesses, one of which does happen to be pedaling).
He added the novel idea that I should turn towards the way I was tilting, as opposed to the opposite.
Holding the back of the seat, Phoebe ran with me as I began to straighten. As she let go, I accomplished a total of three pedals before unintentionally turning into a driveway. She jumped and cheered, I screamed; the task had been achieved.
With Chih’s Capital Bikes timer quickly running low, an embarrassingly high number of people now perceiving me from their windows, and multiple rat sightings, we headed back to the rack.
Despite my challenges, I had a pretty fun adventure. I thanked Phoebe for her support and athleticism (she really was running alongside me) and returned to the safety of my bike-free home.
Did I learn to ride a bike? Technically, no. Will I try again? Unsure. Am I proud of myself? Oddly, yes. I faced my fear of trying and improved along the way.
Attempting a skill notoriously mastered in youth can be intimidating, but I’m reminded that failure is normal and failure is good. Leading up to my trial, I ran into plenty of Hoyas who also could not ride a bike. If I were great at biking, I would’ve missed out on the hilarious stories, connection with my dad, and vulnerable friendship-building I experienced in my quest to learn.
Next time I go to Trader Joe’s, though, I’m walking.
