My bike

I love my bike. We have a good time together. But to be truthful, I have an abusive relationship with it. I don’t look after it. I don’t clean it. I don’t even oil it when it squeaks! But I rely on it every day to get me around. I occasionally pump up the tyres and curse it when I get a puncture. My bike serves me well but I don’t really have feelings for it. It’s just metal and rubber. It isn’t sentient and I’ll probably run it into the ground and when it’s no longer rideable I’ll dump it and get another one. It wasn’t an expensive bike and therefore not worthy of much respect!!
The things we own and how we look after them reflects our attitude to them. Sure, we care about the look of them and the operation of them if it suits us, but bikes don’t pose moral questions for us. I’m not scared of my bike.
Is it though that I’m scared of abusing something because it might ‘bite back’? Whether it’s a child, a car, a dog or a planet, it’s the same attitude: we choose to respect or we choose to abuse. And surely it mostly applies to our fellow travellers, humans. Towards them we usually show respect or regard, especially if there’s no reason NOT to show it. And the animals about us, we may even have those same feelings for them. If so, why not for objects? Is this going too far? This ‘attitude’ takes such a lot of extra energy. Or does it?