September 2025 Top Talk

As mentioned last month, Portland Bicycling Club has built its financial reserves primarily on two annual events: Pioneer Century® and Seattle to Portland. We coordinate them, Pioneer being OUR event ride, and STP being Cascade Bicycle Club’s, but we manage the Finish Line, each and every year. We just do them. They are there to be done. From the feedback I have heard, they are desired functions of the club each year. Hard work but good times together.

Tradition. We do these events because it is our custom to do so. I’ve never heard anyone say we should NOT do them. I myself have questioned whether we CAN do them. I have never questioned whether or not we SHOULD do them because I have seen the benefits year after year.

Other traditions have been lost over the years. Many fun, zany, or challenging rides have ceased to be offered, in large part because the devoted ride leader became unable or unwilling. One example I have been thinking of is the Easter Ride, in which the leader dressed up like a bunny, there was Easter candy, and we rode from Sauvie Island out to St Helens for breakfast and back. Fun times. Years ago we also used to ride out to Multnomah Falls on Memorial Day to meet the returning Columbia Gorge Explorer loaded tour group that was returning from their trek. Then that area got too congested, and that tradition disappeared as well.  ✎

Finally, coming to my point, each year we do many things as a club: rides and events and fun activities that we enjoy at the time and reflect on as part of the structure of the goodness of our lives. We may not be finding a cure for cancer, feeding the hungry, or housing the unhoused, but I see our efforts here in the Portland Metro area benefiting hundreds of people over the year with better health and a better life through exercise, socialization, and fresh air and sunshine.

Things change, and activities that we love fall away, but we keep on doing our best, adding to the club, making memories, and helping each other share in the fun of bicycling.

Ann Morrow, President

To read the Quick Releases newsletter associated with the September 2025 Top Talk, go to Table of Contents.