Categories: Keepers TourLa Vie VelominatusLook ProNostalgiaRantings from the V-Bunker

The Past and the Future

Respect is a cornerstone of La Vie Velominatus.

I’m struggling with how to open this conversation without sounding like what I’m assuming my grandparents did when I was growing up. Maybe it’s because I’m just now clawing my way into some of the wisdom they had, or maybe I’m just less of an idiot than I was when they were moving their lips and I wasn’t listening. (Spoiler alert: everyone is less of an idiot then I was when I was a kid. No need to wait for the memoir.)

Kids these days have no respect.

There. I said it. Let me add some stage directions to this, for clarity.

Stage left, everyone under the age of 25: [heads down, tapping at their phones] Text me. I don’t do “speaking”. [All look up, sigh in chorus, and look back at their phones. Some of the cast members roll their eyes.]

Center stage, anyone between 25 and 37: Yeah, but they’ll learn. Give them a chance to express their ideas on this world and we’ll be happy for their challenging perspective. I embrace their view as it will help us grow both as individuals and a society. Also, Mom and Dad, please text me.

Stage right, everyone else: Bugger off, you disrespectful cretins.

The past informs the future; wisdom is learned through experience and experience is earned through the errors of our actions. That sounds a lot like a rationalization for screwing up all the time and maybe that’s true, but that doesn’t mean the premise is flawed; we must look behind us to understand where we are going. By respecting our past, we may build a better future.

In a world where the young have no respect for the wisdom of age and the old have no appreciation for the genius of youth, La Vie Velominatus cuts through the din and grounds us. Cycling is deeply rooted in the past while fiercely embracing the future. The Cyclist lives happily on both sides of the coin; cherishing our steel frames and hand-made tubular tires while embracing 10 and 11 speed drive-trains and featherweight carbon frames and deep-section wheels.

Keepers Tour 2012 was the first time I’d been to the cobbles of Northern Europe. When we arrived at the mouth of the Arenberg Forest, we were compelled to climb off and pay our respects to this, the most sacred of roads in our sport. By modern measure, this is the worst road imaginable: mossy cobbles roughly strewn across a narrow lane; uneven and sometimes as far as two or three centimeters apart. This is a road so rough it is difficult to walk down. To a Cyclist, it represents the most beautiful road on Earth. This is a road that lets us touch history.

A puzzle is meant to be solved; a mystery is not. The past is a puzzle and the future a mystery. Beauty is found in the space where the past and future live as one. Cycling is beauty.

Vive la Vie Velominatus.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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Gianni says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:19 pm

@wiscot

@ErikdR

@girl

@frank

@PeakInTwoYears

Is that a fountain pen? If so, you have my respect.

To this day I do all my note taking in a moleskine notebook and (ballpoint) pen or mechanical pencil. I'd love to get a nice fountain pen; it is a civilized weapon from a more civilized age.

Nothing beats perfectly weighted medium point blue ballpoint pen and a well sharpened 2B pencil.

Charcoal and goose quills, ya youngsters! * shuffles back to stone slab and chisel*

Stone slab and chisel? Why, back in my day it was charcoal smudges on the cave walls! You kids and your metal tools, whatever next?

What have the cavemen ever done for us, eh? That Gutenberg was onto something I reckon . . .

We used to dream of cave walls...
wiscot says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:22 pm

@Gianni

@wiscot

@ErikdR

@girl

@frank

@PeakInTwoYears

Is that a fountain pen? If so, you have my respect.

To this day I do all my note taking in a moleskine notebook and (ballpoint) pen or mechanical pencil. I'd love to get a nice fountain pen; it is a civilized weapon from a more civilized age.

Nothing beats perfectly weighted medium point blue ballpoint pen and a well sharpened 2B pencil.

Charcoal and goose quills, ya youngsters! * shuffles back to stone slab and chisel*

Stone slab and chisel? Why, back in my day it was charcoal smudges on the cave walls! You kids and your metal tools, whatever next?

What have the cavemen ever done for us, eh? That Gutenberg was onto something I reckon . . .

We used to dream of cave walls...

You win!
ChrissyOne says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:23 pm

And when there was no crawdad, we ate sand.
ErikdR says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:25 pm

@Gianni

@wiscot

Stone slab and chisel? Why, back in my day it was charcoal smudges on the cave walls! You kids and your metal tools, whatever next?What have the cavemen ever done for us, eh? That Gutenberg was onto something I reckon . . .

We used to dream of cave walls...

Heheh... This is turning nicely Monty Python'ish - By Gum, I can almost hear the Yorkshire accents in the air.
ErikdR says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:29 pm

@frank

@girl

If for nothing else, the smell of those pencils is the bomb. Not to mention a good eraser, not that I need one because I never make mistakes.

I don't use these too often but I keep them in my office at work.

Ah, the scent of cedar wood. Yes, absolutely...

As for erasers: as Robert Pirsig observed, the pencil is mightier than the pen.
ErikdR says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:46 pm

@wiscot

@RobSandy

I suppose I'm lucky, but when I went on vacation last year, I didn't take my computer with me. The work folks know my cell # and my e-mail had an out-of-office message. I was on vacation - not working somewhere else other than the office. There's no denying it, too many people are way too addicted to their electronic devices.

You're not lucky - you're wise. I cannot help thinking that it must be this strange illusion of irreplaceability that drives so many people to never, ever put their silly telephones away. While there are so many things that would be much nicer (and healthier) to be addicted to, FFS - bicycles, to name but one.
Chris says:

Jan 15 2015 at 2:53 pm

@frank

@PeakInTwoYears

Is that a fountain pen? If so, you have my respect.

To this day I do all my note taking in a moleskine notebook and (ballpoint) pen or mechanical pencil. I'd love to get a nice fountain pen; it is a civilized weapon from a more civilized age.

I do love a Moleskine, I buy a new one for each project I start. As for propelling pencils, I can still remember having one of these in primary school.

Endless happy wasted taking it apart and putting it back together...
Teocalli says:

Jan 15 2015 at 3:37 pm

@PeakInTwoYears

A medium point Waterman fountain pen, the nib of which I carefully ground into a fine (approx. 1mm) italic nib for taking notes in a Moleskin notebook. In the note above, the thick-thin transitions characteristic of italics nibs are mostly lost because it's on shit computer paper I stole from work.

Definitely +1. I have my grandparents Parker Pens, I dated them a while back circa 1930 I think it was might even have been earlier. I'd post but in the wrong country.

+1 definite for the response.

@frank re Stage right, everyone else: Bugger off, you disrespectful cretins.

Ha - Bloody middle aged youth of the day no respect for the over 37s (by some way). Which statement also seems a trifle at odds with what followed?
Julez says:

Jan 15 2015 at 3:38 pm

Wait, the "youth of today" category is everyone under 25?

But...that includes me!

I'm married, I don't have a~~n iPad~~ generic tablet device, I will make a phone call rather than texting if at all possible, I own vinyl records, I get genuinely excited at the cinema when projecting from celluloid (not digital), and I have recently designed and specced a ground-up bike build from a vintage Bianchi frameset.

Does this make me psychologically older or more mature or something? I don't want to be One Of Those Kids.

(Those Kids scare me...)
Teocalli says:

Jan 15 2015 at 3:43 pm

@Julez

Wait, the "youth of today" category is everyone under 25?

But...that includes me!

I'm married, I don't have a~~n iPad~~ generic tablet device, I will make a phone call rather than texting if at all possible, I own vinyl records, I get genuinely excited at the cinema when projecting from celluloid (not digital), and I have recently designed and specced a ground-up bike build from a vintage Bianchi frameset.

Does this make me psychologically older or more mature or something? I don't want to be One Of Those Kids.

(Those Kids scare me...)

I think it just makes you warped - which probably is why you fit in here!