Colum: Follow the ripples
Ripples – have you ever thought much about them?
I have to admit, I have spent a lot of time contemplating the effects of pebbles. For some odd reason, a small object dropped into a body of water has fascinated me for years. If you take the smallest of pebbles and toss it haphazardly into a pond, you see countless repercussions. One thing I love about nature is its perfect reflection of human society.
I dare you to take any action and follow its effect all the way to the end. There is nothing that is isolated. Regardless of what Paul Simon says, no one is an island. Think about it just for a second – is there anything you can do that doesn’t affect someone else? Everything and everyone is interconnected. I guess this is the basis for choosing to live a life that doesn’t harm others.
The air in my face as I ride my bicycle reminds me everyday of a few things. First, I ride a bicycle. Second, I do it because it feels like the right thing to do. I ride my bicycle because it harms no one and has no negative ripples. This is my stone I have chosen to toss into the pond of American life. Now, I just ride its wake. Soon, I ride my bike to Chile to hopefully push others to do the same. Ride bikes, I mean.
My trip is the culmination of years of ripples flowing over and around me. I was raised in the United States. My idea of an alternative mode of transportation was a four-wheeler that enabled me to take alternative routes. I was blessed or cursed, depending on your view, with curiosity and the inability to allow things to just be. Watching people, their actions and the accompanying consequences, I noticed a few things. Stomachs had grown. The blue sky, I knew as a kid, had become hazy and blurry in my photographs. Children and puppies cried a lot. Tracing these ripples back to their pebbles didn’t take me long. At the end of each ripple was a pollutant-spewing coffin of bad decisions.
Realizing that cars are bad for me and my environment helped motivate me to pedal my own way through life. It also motivates me to write so that others can read and feel similar ripples flow around them. In my desperate search for a better tomorrow, I feel obligated to toss pebbles in the direction of those who I hope will be best affected by them. I guess you could call me a missionary of sorts, spreading the good word of harmless living.
Now that you have read my carefully packaged pebble, its ripple has affected you in some way. Regardless of your opinion about bicycles or the environment, if you read this you have in some way thought about both things.
Many who have seen my ripple tell me I’m crazy. That is fine by me. They still saw my ripple.
Lukas Brinkerhoff is a junior majoring in journalism. His column documents his
bicycle trek to Santiago, Chile.