I started the Old Bike Blog to chronicle my progress on restoring the Columbia, and within about five months, I was done. I had absolutely zero previous experience, just a few tools, and a healthy dose of concern that I would never be able to get the thing put back together correctly. But in the end, I successfully dismantled, cleaned, sanded, painted, re-greased, and reassembled my bike. Today, it is my grocery bike, and has been joined by several other old bikes, all of which I’ve restored or refurbished. My learning curve has been (and still is) extraordinarily steep, and I discovered not only a passion for the work of restoration, but also the absolute importance of really *knowing* your bicycle, inside and out, front and back. It’s something everyone *can* do, and I believe very passionately in the democratizing potential of do-it-yourself bicycle mechanics.  That’s how riding (and working on) bicycles has changed my life, and will continue to do so for many years.

I’m still learing to work on my own bike.  One of the reasons I don’t work on my bike more often is I’m afraid of having it down for too long; that is, me taking too long to figure out what I’m doing and missing riding.  His comments there do give me some confidence and inspiration to attempt to learn and *know* mby bike more.