It was a tight squeeze along the narrow stretch of fence where people are allowed to lock their bikes at Hawthorne station, and I’d sort of boxed another bike in. (Back story: we’ve been pestering Mount Pleasant Town Hall for a bike rack, and last week they said they’d ordered it.) As I unlocked my bike yesterday evening, the owner of the bike I’d boxed in (mind you, he could still get his bike out, though I’d broken the unwritten role of having my bike touch another bike) approached.

“Sorry about that,” I said. “It was kind of a tight squeeze.”

He was cheery, as most people in and around Hawthorne (duh, it’s part of Mount Pleasant) seem to be.

“No problem,” he said with a smile.

We unlocked our bikes side by side.

“Ya know,” I said like an expectant father, “we’re getting a bike rack in six weeks.”

“No way!” he exclaimed. Honest, he actually exclaimed. “How’d that happen?”

I told him about pestering Town Hall. He asked for names. I gave ‘em. He smiled broadly all the while.

“Now if we can just get them to build a few freakin’ sidewalks,” he said before we rode off in different directions.