The first car outside our house was a Vanguard, followed by an Austin, and then came a succession of the latest model Holdens. And thus, started our Saturday afternoon drives. We lived in a working-class Western suburb of Melbourne, so our Saturday drives were through affluent Toorak, South Yarra, Kew, and Camberwell, and sometimes to the Dandenongs and the cities of Frankston and Geelong. Dad never stopped the car on our afternoon drives, and I learnt to appreciate that a weekend drive is about the journey and its moment in time, not the destination. And just as we meandered through the city and suburbs on our Saturday drives, I did the same, years later, on a pushbike. I didn’t choose the bike over a car because I had a love affair with the pushbike. I was once again a penniless full-time university student. My Melbourne city and suburban bike ridings were before the age of the urban cyclist. There were no bike lanes or painted bikeways defined by plastic delineators to separate you from traffic and parked cars; you only became a skilful city cyclist through trial and error. As a young boy, I learned the perils of falling off a bike; and I learnt early in my city cycling to never ride on the tram tracks.

This episode is also available as a blog at drinkingwithflies.wordpress.com