Tuesday, June 24, 2014

A Simple Bicycle Ride

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Nico and Christopher


June 25, 2014

There is so much innocence found in a child’s bicycle ride. I marvel at the freedom I see in my sons’ faces as they pedal their bikes faster and faster. The wind smacking against their little face as they play, ride and gain momentum. They squeal with excitement while they pedal faster and faster with their new found freedom as they build up their joy from the sheer flexibility that let them have. 

My boys have come a long way from my grabbing hands that would reach out from my outreached arms to prevent their forward movement. Especially when they were in those terrible two’s and three’s and I would restrict their roaming from me that equaled an arms length.

Now that I’m an adult and experienced true loss and have aged, I begun to reflect on how the beginning of the loss of my own innocence began. I dare to say it all started when I forgot about the love of my first bicycle and the happiness of finding it. My bike was all the love I needed. Not the sex I would later discover when I hit puberty. I mean seriously. Having a bicycle was almost God like for me as a child.

My purity, the joy, of my two-wheeled, birthday or Christmas gifted, metal friend, started to dissipate into the air. The joy of riding a bike began to be choked out of me when I traded my bike in for the girls I discovered and fantasies of my dream car.

It’s sad to think that someday my sons will grow out of this bike riding stage and eventually ask me for the keys to my car so they can go out on a Saturday night. They are so young and innocent they deserve to think of nothing else but their leisurely bicycle ride. The wars, stock market, death and destruction of nations, should not taint their childhood.

 I dare you to think back to the days of your own bicycle ride as a youth. It’s fun to do. Especially during the times when being an adult sucks. I remember going to the local Zayre’s Department store in city of Lauderhill where I grew up. The bikes were lined up on racks that were stacked on neat shelves. Each bicycle was available to be taken down and sat on. Of course the high up bikes were for the adults but the height placement of the bicycles didn’t deter me from choosing a bike from the top level. Picking out my bike is equivalent to choosing my first automobile. Being such I young child, I was never given the responsibility of picking out anything!

“Dad, I want to see that one,” I said, pointing out to the coolest bike in the world.

“Sorry son, that’s an adult bicycle. You have to choose one that is at your level,” my dad said, pointing to a line of bikes at floor level.

I walked the line of bicycles waiting for one of them to speak to me. There was so many to choose from. Colors, paddings, rims, it had to be right. I wanted to have the coolest bike on my block. Which, unfortunately, would more than likely be the first to be stolen or taken from me from a bigger kid.

“That one,” I said gleefully pointing to a bike gleaming from the fluorescent light bulbs.

The bike was black with thick black mag wheels. Mag wheels were very popular. They weren’t the spoke rims that are commonly seen. These were thick plastic that you know see on strollers and other push objects like lawn mowers have.

The sides were yellow and white, checkerboard flags. The bike grips were yellow and had little raised rubber, thinly sliced, handle bar grips. It soothed my hands as I touched them. The mag wheels made it heavy but I loved the bicycle. My dad knew it. He saw the joy in my eyes and bought it.

Once I was home I couldn’t wait to show off my Huffy to all the kids in the neighborhood. There was nothing else like it. My bike. My joy and gateway to innocence in a not so innocent world but I didn’t care about the oil scares, Iran Contra Aid or political elections. It was just my bike and I. I was innocent, in a brutal world, without a care of what was going on. Much like my own children today. I just hope I can continue their innocence for as long as their own bikes will take them before I hand them my keys to the car. 


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