Every day we are faced with choices.  Choices like left or right or up or down define the kind of people we are.  We have the choice to go out of our way to brighten someone’s day, pick up a piece a trash we see floating through the street, or volunteer our time to help make the world a better place.

You must be wondering who I am and why I am choosing to write this entry, and I’m right there with you.  I’m not much of a writer being my day job is practicing as a traffic engineer in Dallas, where I figure out ways to help move motor vehicle traffic through the street network.  However, in my time, I enjoy being an active bicycle and transit rider as well as photographer, hence the witty blog name.  I like to challenge myself in obscure ways (ask me about my #weekendof14s), and this blog could be just another one of those quirky adventures. I am hoping to learn about myself through the process, which I hope to explain more at a later date, as well as make people aware of the benefits that I have experienced through taking public transportation and enjoying the great outdoors.

Back to those choices.  How many times have you walked down the street and noticed a piece of trash?  How many of those instances do you make an effort to pick it up and find a proper place for it?  I can think of a few instances where I can honestly say that I did just that.  It’s a simple task that takes very little time out of our day. Do we notice a difference in the landfill outside of town?  Do we even care what the landfill looks like?  Eh, probably not, but we probably feel a little bit better about ourselves for trying to do the right thing.

This feeling, of doing the right thing, slapped me in the face the other day when I was riding the DART (Dallas Area Rapid Transit) back from a Halloween Party.  I rode the Blue Line to the end, the Downtown Rowlett Station.  From there I rode my bicycle seven miles to the party.  The total journey was approximately thirty miles one way.  As I hopped on the train for the journey home and I crossed pastures and creeks of the rural DFW communities, I escaped.  I felt like I was in another country.  I became lost in time, imagining I was in some far off place travelling through the beautiful countryside via train.  A quick flash of an industrial park brought me back to reality where I realized that I was making a difference.  I was on an electric vehicle with multiple other people, simply enjoying the ride.  I was tempted to pull out my book and read a few pages, but this moment was special and I chose to live in it.  The gentleman beside me struck up a conversion about his trusty ole bicycle and we quickly compared notes on each other’s steeds.  Never in my nine years of driving have I had a conversation about my bicycle with another motor vehicle user on the road.  It’s nearly impossible.  The choice I made to ride the train turned out to be a good one.  While I may not physically see drastic impacts on air quality or a slowdown in global warming, I am having conversations with random people, hearing their stories, and truly enjoying my time spent on public transportation- something I can’t experience in a motor vehicle.

#movebetter

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