Morning Ride

Ordinarily, when I ride to work at 6:00 am every day, I am alone on the sidewalk and share the road with a handful of cars. Despite having the sidewalk to myself (usually), I have taken to wearing a helmet light (a very nice Princeton Tec Eos) so that I can see a little farther ahead than my fork-mounted dynamo light allows. I started doing this after I nearly hit a jogger in dark clothing who was coming toward me but somehow oblivious to my dyno-light.

This morning, if I hadn't had my helmet light, I would have hit a person on a bike with an enormous black garbage bag perched on the front basket. Perfectly camouflaged. Virtually invisible. The only thing I saw was the glint of the pedal reflectors, thanks to my helmet light. My dyno-light would not have reflected off the pedals far enough ahead.