I could describe in detail every bike I’ve owned since I got my first two-wheeler—brand, color, number of gears, etc.

Those bikes transported me back and forth to my job, gave me twenty-five years of biking vacations, allowed me to pick up and go on my time schedule, park where there were no parking spaces and smell the lilacs blooming each May as I whizzed by them on my way home from work, all without polluting the planet.

But there is a time and place for everything, and now that Peter can’t bike any more and we are moving to a new city, it seemed that it was time for me to say good-bye to my bicycle.

I offered it for sale on our neighborhood List-serve, and within minutes had several responses. In the end, ten people wanted it and I sold it to the first responder. She offered to let me keep it until we move, but I thought I should let it go immediately. It wouldn’t get easier. She said that having my bike would be like keeping a bit of me here.

It will be more than just a bit.