Or one of them, anyway. Before I sold my bike, I sold my house, which made it necessary for me to sell this beauty. I have never moved when it didn't cost me money, and it seems like the more home you have, the more money it costs to move. So, knowing I'll have to pay for carpet cleaning, septic tank checks, home repairs, moving vans, deposits on utilities, and a whole host of other shit, and knowing I don't ever really have lots of disposable cash, I had to find something of value to sell.
I sold this bike.
Rivendell Atlantis, 58cm. I really loved this bike, even though I didn't ride it a whole lot. I bought the frame in 2003 and built it up myself. The frame was a little tall for me, but I wanted 700c wheels and those frames started at 58. That's probably why I didn't ride it as much as I thought I would. Most of the time I was just tooling around on it, doing errands, commuting to work, or playing.
It had several combinations of parts. At one time it had moustache handlebars, which I hated. Some people swear by them, but I just found them awkward. It had drop bars and bar end shifters once. Finally I landed on the priest style bars you see here with cork grips. That bar gave me a very upright and comfortable position, but I always felt very slow.
In this photo, which was the last one I took of it and is the one on the ebay listing that helped sell the bike, it has 35x700c tires. It orignially kept 700x28s on it until two summers ago I rode it to the bike shop I worked at. That day a man from New Zealand came in the shop needing a new tire. He was riding across the United States raising money for some thing or another. The shop didn't have any 28s in stock, so I pryed mine off and gave them to him. I hope that helped him make it the rest of the way. I checked his blog webpage or whatever and he mentioned his experience.
The Atlantis origninally had a honey brown Brooks B17. I rode it for a while but I could never really get into that thing. I always felt like I was sliding off the seat. I took it off and replaced it with the black SelleMarco that came with my Trek 470. That was always a comfy seat.
I had my Nitto Cro-Mo steel rear rack on it, with old cordura panniers that I carried groceries and clothes and stuff in when I commuted to the Fire Department. Several of those trips drew Pee-wee Herman comments from the guys.
I bought a sidecar from Chariot and installed it on this bike. I would put my son in there when he really needed a nap and it worked like a charm. By the time I got down Basham Lane he would already be fast asleep. Once we made it to Dunbar Cave road, on the part above Basham, and he was still awake. There were several deer by the side of the road and he and I got to get very close to them and watch for a while. For a three year-old he was pretty impressed. I used to get off work when I was a teacher, go home, get the Atlantis and the sidecar and go pick my son up from his daycare in it. Strange looks again from folks at the daycare, but I must have made it look pretty good, cause thats where I met my wife. She said all the girls there called me "the Bicycle Man." Eh.
So anyway, I opened a bike shop and I have even more bikes now. I haven't gotten to ride nearly as much and so having this beautiful thing just haning in my garage wasn't making sense. I took some pictures, uploaded on ebay, and seven days later the bike was sold. I knew I was doing the right thing; I needed the money, the bike deserved to be ridden. But damn, when the time came to pack the bike up, it was a lot harder than I expected it to be. I had no idea of the emotional attachment I had to the bike.
I took it to my shop and got out a box and all the packing material for the bike. It was difficult to fit the bike in the box I wanted to ship in, but after some struggles and frustrations and emotions, I got it in there and off to UPS. I had a hard time with it . . . I know there was so much more going on with me and with the act of packing the bike, but I'm having a really tough time finding words for it. Dad came in and saw me struggling and asked what the problem was. When he did all this stuff just came out about my not wanting to sell the bike and not feeling like it was worth it when I knew where the money was going and about how I'll never have another bike like this one and that I had lots of memories and blah, blah, blah.
At any rate, the bike has by now met its new owner and I hope he's very happy. I have already spent about $300 in our moving experience. It certainly has made my last few weeks a lot easier, but every time I pull out some cash from my wallet, I can't help but think about the times I rode that bike with my stuff strapped on it, or my son cradled in it, or my problems figured out on it.
I'll miss my bike.
