Get On The Bike
I was thinking about my bike the other day. Not the Schwinn mountain bike I own now, and don't ride nearly enough. The bike I had in fifth grade, a classic yellow Huffy dirt bike. I loved that bike. It was stolen from the bike rack at school, but I can't say I was too broken up about it. I rode that bike hard, and it had served me well.
I don't remember what I got after that. A Team Murphy dirtbike, maybe. Always with the dirt bikes, even though I wasn't aware of BMX or stunt riding at the time. But I sure rode over plenty of curbs and small hills in my day.
I grew up in a neighborhood, an old part of northeast Topeka called Oakland that was sequestered from the rest of town by the Kansas River and Shunganunga Creek. It was like it's own little town in a lot of ways, and I guess that's exactly what it was way back when. Oakland was a perfect place to grow up with a bike. It had boundaries, dirt trails, alleys, a municipal airport, a river, and most of all, a reasonably-sized grid of streets and modest houses built between the 20's and 50's.
I remember reaching that age when I finally had the freedom and the time to roam on my bike, to meet the world (such as it was in Oakland) on my own terms. You picked who you visited, where you spent your time, and what tricks you could and couldn't do. You learned how to fix your bike on the fly and which alleys had dogs that would chase you (and which ones could catch you).
You saw the immediate world beyond your own little block. You took in the long summer days, the coolness and breeze of autumn. It was the start, albeit a very small one, of the process of leaving your childhood home. First, you got to know your neighbors. Then you were old enough to learn your block. Then you walked the three blocks to your school.
Then the bike changed everything. Your territory grew exponentially.
I started riding the neighborhood at around fourth or fifth grade, and I think I was almost completely done by the time I was in 7th or 8th grade. I don't remember why I stopped, but everyone I knew did, at about the same time. Maybe it wasn't cool anymore, or we just couldn't wait to get into cars in a short year or two. In reality, it was probably just the same wanderlust that led me onto the bike in the first place. I wanted to see more of my world. I had seen all Oakland had to offer. I was interested in the rest of Topeka. (And who wouldn't be!) I was ready to keep exploring. My bike languished in the garage, unused, and then was gone. Maybe we sold it. I don't remember.
It's funny-It feels like I spent my whole childhood on my bike in my neighborhood, but it was really only about three or four years. Is that all it was?
Our lives get segmented into little units that aren't always apparent at the time we are living them. There is that time of life when you have no worries, you have time to enjoy the summer, and you aren't old enough to worry about a job or the Communists or anything else but how you will have fun that day with your friends.
And chances are, you'll be riding your bike.
10:21:12 AM 
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