Cages & Cagers

Cager – according to the Urban Dictionary a popular word among motorcyclists and bicyclists for four wheeled motor vehicle drivers. The term is often used in a derogative sense, because the car body effectively forms a cage, isolating the said driver from having to interact with other road users.  Recent Harley Davidson commercials feautred this concept as a rider cruised through the city streets while everyone around him are locked in their cages.
I recently had the pleasure of an interaction with one of these cagers, driving down the road directly beside me in their hot little sportscar, music blaring so loud the car was bouncing with the base beats, mindlessly switching lanes directly into my side while on my other side a tractor trailer unit blocked my escape options. Behind us cars honked loudly seeing the impending accident but the sportscar driver was oblivious to sounds outside his cage. It wasn't until the sound of my boot against his passenger door echoed in his car that this driver even realized I was there.
My experience isn't unique among bikers unfortunately. It illustrates not only the hazards for bikers, but the way many of us live our lives. In a cage. Often of our own creation. Isolating us from others and from really interacting with the world around us.
These cages can take many forms and we all have one of some sort. Limiting our interactions to individuals of a certain social class, religious belief, or political belief is a cage. Living your life and making decisions based on certain books and theories is a cage. Dressing and decorating based on trends is a cage. If it's not a Harley it's not a real bike is a cage! If it is not a Dodge it is not a real truck is a cage!
All of these cages limit our interactions with others, and limit the way we enjoy and experience life. These cages though, are cages of our own creation that we can easily break out of. There are other cages though that while we may create them or innocently put ourselves in them, they are not so easily broken out of.
How many of us have the bars of our cages formed by debt, and find that cage getting smaller and smaller every day. We enter that debt innocently and with the best of intentions, though more often than not for things we want, rather than need, and regardless of your ability to pay that debt back, it still creates limits on your life, bars on your cage.
Then there are other cages even more severe and limiting. People find themselves in situations of abuse and violence, the bars on their cage created by their desire to appear happy, or preserve their family. Bars so strong that what it takes to break them often destroys the person trapped in that cage.