Essay
Four Seasons in a Yellow Jacket
四季一件黄冲锋衣
The ride is eleven minutes if the lights on Saint-Denis cooperate and twenty if it has snowed. I know every pothole between my apartment in Villeray and the brewery door in Mile End, and I know which ones get worse in April, when the frost comes out and the asphalt quietly gives up.
I bought the yellow jacket six years ago because it was on sale and because I was tired of being invisible. In November, at five in the afternoon, this city is already dark and wet and full of people who are not looking. Yellow is not a fashion decision. It is an argument you make to a driver's peripheral vision.
Studs, salt, one stubborn derailleur
From December to March I run studded tires and a chain I clean more often than my kitchen. The salt eats everything. I learned that in the garage: parts fail at the bench, not on the road. So the derailleur gets looked at in the stairwell of my building, under a bad bulb, with the radio going and Barley waiting at the top of the steps.
The jacket is ugly and I have never once regretted it.
There is a stretch on Clark where the bike lane vanishes for a block and you briefly become an argument between two parked cars. I take the lane there. You have to. Hesitation is what gets you hit; I have believed that since I was twenty-two and stupid on a motorcycle, and I believe it more now that I am thirty-four and stupid only about deadlines.
What arriving smells like
The brewery smells of warm grain and caustic and, on brewing days, like a bakery that has been drinking. I come in with snow in my beard and my glasses fogged, and for the first ten minutes I am useless. I change in the little room by the mash tun, hang the yellow jacket on its hook, and become a person with a job.
Winter is not the enemy. Ice is the enemy, and ice does not care what month it is.
Hockey helps. I listen to the game on one earbud riding home, and if the game is bad I listen to a record instead. Last week I rode the whole way with a 1978 pressing I paid four dollars for at a shop on Mont-Royal, and I got home before the last song, which almost never happens.
People ask why I do not just take the metro in January. I have tried. It is warm and fast and full of people wearing grey, and I arrive at the brewery having learned nothing about the day. On the bike I know exactly how cold it is, exactly which streets have been plowed, and exactly how late I am.
中文译文
圣但尼街的红绿灯配合的话，这一趟十一分钟；下过雪就要二十分钟。从 Villeray 的住处到 Mile End 的厂门，每个坑我都认得，也知道哪几个到了四月会变本加厉——冻土一化，柏油就悄悄撂挑子。
那件黄冲锋衣是六年前买的，因为打折，也因为我受够了当隐形人。十一月的下午五点，这城市已经又黑又湿，满街都是不看路的人。黄色不是审美选择，是冲着司机余光喊的一句话。
防滑钉、融雪盐和一只倔强的后拨
十二月到三月，我用带钉的胎，链条擦得比厨房还勤。盐吃一切。这是修车厂教的：零件是在工位上坏的，不是在路上坏的。所以后拨在楼道里检修，头顶一只昏灯泡，收音机开着，Barley 趴在楼梯最上面等。
这外套是丑，我一次也没后悔过。
Clark 街上有一段，自行车道消失一个路口，你就临时变成两辆停着的车之间的一场争论。那段我占整条车道。必须占。犹豫才容易被撞；二十二岁骑摩托犯傻时我就这么信，如今三十四岁，只对交期犯傻，更信了。
到厂时是什么味道
厂里是温热麦糟和碱水的味道，糖化那天还像一间喝过酒的面包房。我进门时胡子挂着雪，眼镜起雾，头十分钟基本是个废人。在糖化罐边的小屋里换衣服，黄外套挂上钩子，我才变成一个有工作的人。
冬天不是敌人。冰才是敌人，而冰不在乎现在是几月。
冰球帮了忙。回家路上我一只耳朵听比赛，比赛难看就改听唱片。上周我一路骑着一张 1978 年的片子，在 Mont-Royal 一家店里四块钱买的，居然在最后一首歌之前到了家，这几乎没发生过。
有人问我一月为什么不干脆坐地铁。我试过。暖和、快、满车穿灰衣服的人，到了厂里，对这一天一无所知。骑车的话，我清楚今天到底多冷，哪几条街铲过了，以及我晚了多少。
