I keep two photos in my wallet: my 9 year old brother’s school photo and a drawing of my late friend and queer elder figure Hansel. I’ve been pulled away from both of these important people, by a strenuous relationship with a family member and by death. I’ve been looking through old photos a lot lately, and while scrolling past old photos from early 2023 of my Trek 1100, I experienced a new emotion: bike nostalgia.

Why am I feeling nostalgia for this shuddering aluminum clatterfuck? It couldn’t fit bigger than 28s and the too-big frame required me to slam the seatpost, which of course sported some heavily used mystery saddle. I was so eager to get away from this bike, and I did when I built my Fuji. My Fuji was the antithesis of it in many ways: steel frame, fat tires, 26in, canti brakes.

After a bit of thinking, I realized it wasn’t actually the bike itself I was yearning for, but what it stood for: riding a hundred or more miles per week on an “uncool” bike that made no sacrifices to comfort or utility. Was the milk crate on the cheap rear rack ugly? Yeah. Did it do a really good job of carrying my backpack back and forth to school? Yeah. Were the bottle cages cheap and dinky and ugly? Yeah, but they carried enough water for me. Was the cockpit not at all aero or high leverage? Yep.

donut run!

But it was so fucking comfortable—even with those stupid 28s and shuddery aluminum frame. That bike was absolutely everything I needed from it then. I was eager to get away from what I considered a shitbox, but looking back at it, it’s no wonder that it facilitated my falling in love with bikes as a lifestyle. If I’m honest with myself, I miss it. I think the yearning for something of almost pure comfort and utility that rejects the dominant idea of coolness is responsible for my crosscheck dreams. The lightning bolt built following trekthought will be very cool.

great highway with emily and kat :)

The 1100 was also in my life at an important time. I was beginning to crack my second egg (boy->they->*girl; you are here), and I was becoming immersed in a community of lovely people. All these photos are from school-lunch-break excursions that filled me with a sense of freedom or rides with friends. I fell in love with bikes while doing lunch time donut runs to donutworld and riding up and down the great highway with kat and emily. I was coming out of my shell in more ways than one, and this bike really helped with that. I learned a lot about myself on this bike.

the coolest cockpit

We’re coming up on one year since losing Hansel, a gut wrenching, heartbreaking process that taught me how to grieve, how to be in community, and how to to truly embrace joy. A year without them, I still feel like I’m learning from them. They taught me a lot about being queer without realizing it. My biggest regret is not coming out to Hansel before we lost them. Without knowing it, they showed me just how much joy could exist in the simple act of being queer. It was their voice in my head that finally brought me to come out to Jerry, Kat, Jay and Emily. Oh the things an out Hansel and I would have gotten up to. Their voice still keeps me going as I figure out this whole queerness thing.

I remember one night, after community night, me, Jerry and Hansel hung out in the living room on JFK, and talked about gender. I was so close at that point, I wish I had told them then.

I recently returned to that family member’s house with my partner and mother’s support to gather some things, among those a drawing of Hansel and a photo of my brother. While there I wrote a letter to my brother and left it on his desk.

The drawing of Hansel was made after they passed, based on a photo of them in drag posing with my bike at trans march 2023, the happiest I’d ever seen them. I got sick last week, and I’m only just beating it, so I missed trans march this year, having to watch it from my couch through my friends’ instagram stories, but the whole day, I thought of Hansel. I’ve come a long way since summer of 2023, in no small part thanks to them. The bike they posed with in that photo is my fuji, the successor to my trek—a bike that was like the fisher price version of the last bike they rode, their rivendel platypus. Their first test ride of that bike was the second happiest I’d ever seen them.

I still feel them when I’m near the Pacific. I think if I whisper my name into the ocean and tell them, I’ll feel better.

Hansel at Trans March 2023 in drag. So fucking beautiful. Serving. Photo: Jerry.

Tell everyone you love in your life that you love them or you’ll regret not doing it when they die. I passed in Walgreens today despite my absolutely ravaged post-sick voice. I wish I could tell hansel. I hope my brother writes me back.