Getting Up on That Bike Again
“Bicycle, bicycle, bicycle
I want to ride my bicycle, bicycle, bicycle
I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride my bike
I want to ride my bicycle
I want to ride it where I like”
Freddy Mercury/Queen/ Jazz,1978
Remember those carefree days when the breeze tossed your hair while soaring along the streets of your neighborhood on your bicycle? The freedom of being able to go where you wanted? Riding with friends?
I can’t have been much more than 10 when my brother and I were allowed to ride as far as the local convenience store. There were sidewalks all the way and our parents deemed it safe. Off we went with 50 cents to buy candy. We were 8 and 10 and came back home with Pixy Stix, Zotz, Razzle’s and Pez. We collected Wacky Packages trading cards and read the comic in Bazooka gum. What a time that was…
I have early memories of my first bike – a tricycle. I can still see the sparkly red enamel in my mind’s eye. When brother Bill came along, our folks got a slightly larger trike for me that was mostly white with red trim. We would ride 3 or 4 blocks to Cedar Brook Park with my Mom walking behind us.
One day, Bill wanted the big bike and so we raced around the lake to get to it. Close to the finish line, the gravel path got the better of me and my knees. I’m not sure how we or the bikes got home, but I do remember going to the doctor for stitches. I swear he used a regular needle and thread while he told me about the butterfly he would put on my knee. It wasn’t exactly the winged beauty I imagined.
A year later I got a bike with training wheels and the big trike became Bill’s.
At the ripe old age of seven, I had a major crush on neighbor Keith. I don’t know if my parents realized my level of hero worship, but they paid Keith to teach me how to ride without training wheels. Not wanting to disappoint my charming prince, I learned how to ride the pale blue steed with the white streamers flowing from its handle bars. In my mind I was the princess – and in reality, I was a scrawny thing with thick glasses whose frames had little diamonds in the cat’s eye corners – plus they matched my bike. Like most princes out of your reach at seven, he was kind and patient and straight out of a fairy tale.
Eventually I graduated to the classic cruiser in a brighter blue that I kept throughout high school. I didn’t ride it nearly as much. I had a bike when I was a young Mom too, but can’t say that I remember any adventures. The bike hung from ceiling hooks above my minivan gathering dust for years in the garage.
I’ve been thinking about bicycles and exercise and the demon arthritis that lives in my knees. I gave up my gym membership with the pandemic and started walking. I’ve committed to a few 5k’s, but maybe I could do more? I flipped and flopped about trying a bike again. The stationary bike was an instrument of torture in PT last year, so I was trepidatious. But then I thought of all the stories and happy memories and looked at Facebook Marketplace.
Len had a bike for sale, a royal purple beauty that made me wonder if I could find a helmet to match? Maybe I could figure out how to get a tiara and helmet to morph together? I was a princess after all in my younger days – and helmets could use an upgrade!
I tried Len’s bike. It had 21 speeds and air brakes. One ride around the circle in the cul-de-sac and I was trembling with PTSD similar to my one ride on a motorcycle. My instinct was to come to a stop using the pedal brakes, totally forgetting about the hand brakes. There was also a slight discomfort in the dismount – I hadn’t swung my leg over a bike in 20 years. It felt odd and more than a little disconcerting.
As it turns out, I’m not a big fan of the mountain bike. It felt light. And I didn’t trust myself to stop with the air brakes.
Onto cruisers! The bike my Mom rode with baby me along the boardwalks of Atlantic City was a cruiser. My memory was sporting rose colored glasses. My bike would be chic, so retro.
Dev had a cruiser bike for sale. It was a soft amethyst and so pretty. I had checked out the local bike shop and cruisers were on backorder, and sold out through the end of the year. Apparently, I’m not the only one who wants a bike! Maybe it was performance anxiety, but I just couldn’t ride the bike in front of Dev and his wife with neighbors looking on. I tried. I walked the bike a ways away and tried again out of sight. I couldn’t balance the bike to save my life. I couldn’t get my knee up fast enough or at all to use the second pedal. I went home. Defeated.
I’m sad to report my days of riding a bike are over. Well…maybe. No mountain bikes. No cruisers. I might consider a recumbent bike, but how do you balance it to get going. Maybe I’ll go back to the big trike – don’t they make them for adults? Maybe I need a handsome prince?
I can say, that with or without a 2-wheeled vehicle in my garage, I have learned how to get back up on that proverbial bike in life.
“Life is like riding a bicycle. In order to keep your balance, you must keep moving.”
Albert Einstein