It has taken about 5 months of living CarFree and almost exactly one month to the day for my bike commute to become routine.

I didn’t realize this was even something that happened until this morning.  Biking has been in my routine for 5 months but today it became “routine” to me.  I was about half way through my ride this morning  and it hit me that today was the first time I had packed up and left the house without thinking.  I did your basic phone, wallet, keys check but that was about it.  I didn’t have to stop and go through the deliberate steps of getting my bike together, making sure I had my lock, stopping before I leave to tuck my pant leg into my sock.  It all just kind of happened and I didn’t even think to do it.

I think this is a pretty big breakthrough but I’m not really that happy about it because it also takes away one of my favorite parts of living CarFree, the time for me.  Today it was as if I wasn’t even awake until halfway through my ride and I’m sure before long it will be 3/4 then 100% of the ride on most days.  This phenomenon is in direct conflict with all those glowing entries I have written over the past few months about how good my ride makes me feel, my level of mental awareness, etc.

This situation begs 2 questions: 1. Is this such a bad thing? and 2. Should I try to slow or stop it and embrace that time/feeling?  I’m beginning to think this is not really bad thing at all.  I started this blog to document  my personal journey to living CarFree and a major part of that is truly making my bike commute part of my life.  Until this point, there has still been some novelty in it for me which has tempered my reaction issues thus far to mask my true emotions and cloud the experience.  

To my second question, I say NO!  For all the reasons above and many more I have to let this thing develop naturally.  Truth be told, I don’t know if I could do anything to stop the shift.  Even when I get my full 6 hours of sleep, I’m still not all there at 530 when I hop on my bike each morning.

It has just occurred to me that documenting my struggle to live CarFree may have begun today because for lack of a better phrase “it just got real”!