...We're just broken and we work in a broken industry

Chemical Warfare

The other day I was at work and I was trying to free up the hinges of an older front derailleur on a mountain bike. Although the derailleur was now moving towards it's second decade of service it didn't appear to have suffered too many life ending crashes it just resisted most of my efforts in order to move freely again.

After a couple of baths with a penetrating oil and being repeatedly having the hinges and springs assaulted by a high pressure air hose I finally had to resort to chemical warfare. I'm a bit of a pack rat and I had a canister of carburetor cleaner at home so I made a mad dash home, fetched my can of Gumout, and unleashed an unholy amount of lethal chemicals upon the halpless derailleur. After assailing the finicky gear mech was able to get it to move freely again.

Even though I used what safety precautions I had available to me (chemical filter mask, safety goggles, leaving the doors open in order to get better ventilation)  I still think I had obliterated all my memories concerning the third grade.

And that brings me to my point and that is I can't help but think about the toxicology reports would be for your average bike mechanic. We play with all sorts of nasty stuff, chain lubes, greases, anti- seize compounds, carbon prep compounds, solvents, bikes that have been doused with  radiator fluid, sports drinks, sticky energy bar residues (thanks triathletes), brake fluids, dust from milling a variety of different frame materials and not to mention the variety of sicknesses that only working with the general public will expose you to.

I've talked to several industry insiders about the notoriously low wages the bike industry pays people but in practical terms that means often having to buy lower quality foods or fast foods because few people get a true lunch hour (a working half hour lunch break is more the norm), relatively poor health coverage (often times only catastrophic coverage, if  you're lucky) meaning optical, and dental concerns are deferred meaning, your nearly blind mechanic can't chew their own food.

So, if you walk into a shop and your tech is a little grumpy try to understand, our brains are rotting due to unregulated exposure to toxic chemicals, bad food, and ruined bodies. We may self medicate with large amounts of cannabis, alcohol, cigarettes, junk food, alcohol and whatever else we can get our dirty little hands on but that doesn't mean we are bad people, we're just broken and we work in a broken industry.