Today is my blog’s second birthday. I started the blog to gently mock my sister’s daily blog of her lunch (check it out–it’s actually sublime). I certainly didn’t expect to still be writing it, almost every day, two years later. But here we are, I’m still riding and writing, and both still bring me immense amounts of pleasure. One of the things the blog has done is forced me to pay attention as I move through the world. Even if I’ve been down the same road three hundred times, it is always different, and I am always different. That’s the great thing about time and perspective–there is always so much to see. I could say that the blog also keeps me riding my bike, you know, so I’ll have something to write about every day, but that would be a bit of a fib. I love riding my bike. I mean really, really love it. I love the clipping in to my pedals and just spinning away, making a breeze, pedaling hard, or coasting and looking around (my saddle already shows the imprint of this little habit…), and staying balanced and paying attention in ways only a bicycle can help you do. I wanted to ride like that today, so after work I rode out to Harahan for an appointment that I’d usually drive to. I took the levee path along the river, taking note of birds and waves and ships and industrial plants and the happy fact that that one suitcase I used to note every time I passed, is finally gone. I rested for a minute under the Huey P. Long bridge in a tiny bit of shade, sipping water and watching the guys weld new beams for that same bridge, sheltered from the sun by big rainbow beach umbrellas. I rode through Elmwood’s warehouse district, thinking about all the industrial stuff going on all around us that most of us just never see. I took Jefferson Highway back, agreeing with a friend that Jefferson Parish isn’t the most bike-friendly place and wishing I’d just stayed on the damned levee. I stopped and took a picture of these blue drums against green grass at the strangely beautiful Carrollton Water Treatment Plant, finally back in Orleans parish. I had ice cream and cruised the new St. Charles asphalt, watching a much older man on a much older bike weave in and out of white dashes marking the new parking lane, thankful to have two years in and a lifetime to explore by bike.