Helmet Head

I wear a bicycle helmet. Proudly.

I am the owner of a blue, hideously ugly, bicycle helmet. It was the last one available without neon-colored stripes in all of Reykjavik. Luckily, I happen to look good in just about any headwear. My husband, bless him, does not. Put my helmet on him and he transforms into the village idiot. Over the years I have bought him every variation of hat I could find and every time he tried one on he looked like his IQ plunged into single digits. Sometimes, for amusement and general jollity, he will wear my helmet around the apartment.
Another hideously ugly detail about the helmet was the price. It cost around 3000 Icelandic Krona which is about $40. Two weeks after I bought mine, I was in Sweden where they seemed to be selling for around $20. Also they were nicer looking. I tell myself that they were of lesser quality.

Ok, so I don’t wear my helmet proudly. But I wear it with a healthy amount of self-knowledge. You see, I am Traffically Challenged. I have biked into parked cars. I have walked at a leisurely pace into pillars, doors and Michael Stipe of R.E.M. And I have managed some formidable forward falls down stairs and on flat pavements.
I don’t know that I am clumsy, nor do I have any balance issues – ask anyone who has practiced yoga with me; I can hold Tree Pose (a fancy-schmansy way of saying standing on one foot) like, forever. But when I start moving it is as if the motion of my body puts my brain into super spin. I start thinking, writing, planning, directing and ruling the world. Yes, I am the crazy lady who talks to herself as she walks down the street. Unfortunately, this explosive brain function does not extend to noticing the surrounding traffic. Quite the contrary, the faster I am going the more introvert my focus is. And that is just not a practical combo.
In Reykjavik the minority of bike riders past the age of 21 months wear helmets. We are a precious few, known by our furtive glances and practical shoes. But then again there aren't that many who use bikes for transportation altogether; Iceland has the highest rate of car ownership per capita bar the US.
I am not one of that capita. I have never owned a car. In my youth I did obtain a license to drive, but in my hands you might as well give me a license to kill. Mostly I have lived in places where cars were redundant, but the longer I live in Iceland the more I feel that having a car would be practical. Take for example the city of Reykjavik; it has fantastically bad public transport and none of the bicycle paths that are common in the rest of the Nordic countries. Yet there is some concern that the younger Icelandic generations are getting overweight. Really? Ya think? Perhaps if there was half a chance of getting around without the use of a car people would actually walk or bike? And if people actually used their bikes as transportation, they might catch on to the whole helmet thing too.
Every time I take my little red bike for an unfocused spin I conquer the fear of ridicule and bad hair, because in the words of a Finnish Minister of Health:
"If you don't wear a helmet, you obviously have nothing to protect."