Reflections On A Broken Seatpost

So I was riding around today, minding my own business, when this car decides to pass me right before a patch of potholes. I can't swing out, and even with the cleanest line, I still hit one or two of the smaller holes. My bike made a little bit of a popping kind of noise, but I thought everything was ok. See, the springs in my brakes aren't as strong as they used to be, and they weren't good brakes to begin with, so there's a good bit of play in the levers. Usually they rattle around a bit when I hit something, so I thought that was it and just rode on. As I kept going, I noticed that my seatpost had a kind of vibration-dampening quality that I hadn't noticed before. Kind of unusual because I've used the same post for the four years I've had the bike. I thought it was no big deal until vibration-dampening slowly turned into mushy-feeling. I decided I didn't want to end up riding ten miles without a seat, so I went home. Turns out my post had a two-inch-long vertical crack, one inch in each direction from the collar. So now I'm using an old Bontrager Select we had lying around. I have yet to see how it rides, but I wouldn't mind it being a little harsher than the old one. I'd rather feel connected than not have a sense of the road.

-Russ