Do You Remember Your First Bicycle?

Of course, you do. Who doesn’t? First bicycles were rites of passage. On wheels, no less. That simple question, perhaps posed at a dinner table, can unleash memories, not all of them necessarily factual, that can fill many hours.

Everyone outdoes everyone else with stories of their first bike.  Everyone had the biggest, the shiniest, the fastest.  The most streamers.  The biggest basket. The nicest flag.  The loudest horn. The brightest headlight.

And that’s all before the “war stories” begin.  We hear tales of the most terrible of bike accidents, again not always factual, but designed to get oohs and aahs from the audience. Occasionally, there’s even a show-and-tell. An old scar, a bit of gravel still embedded in a knee. Evidence of where it all went down, so to speak.

I sit quietly during all of this.  I don’t say a word.  I just listen.  I wait until the testosterone has died down.  And then I pounce.   I know I can’t compete in the normal way of things but I also know I’ll win the “first bicycle story” competition. I always do.  

My first bicycle appeared at our side door in a pick-up-truck.  It was blue. Two nice men brought it into the house.  They carried it into the living room, took it around the corner and up the stairs to the second floor, then down another hall, past the bedrooms, and up more stairs to the attic.  They put it in one of the dormers with a view of the busy street we lived on.   They pulled down the kickstand which went all the way under the back wheel and sort of jacked it up a bit. And then they left.  You might say it was an unwanted prototype of the stationary bicycle.  It stayed there, in its spot.  Forever.  It never saw the light of day or met a sidewalk.  And, when I was pedaling away on my first bicycle, neither did I.

Don’t feel bad for me.  Think of all the fun I’ve had with that story through the years. Some sacrifices are simply worth the price of admission.