Don't Think So...

Plan: Bike the Chattahoochee Riverwalk today. Not incredibly hot; slightly overcast. Shouldn't be crowded; close by. We'll ride past the Dillingham Street bridge to see what we missed yesterday.

Execution: Haul the two, 15 year-old bikes out of the storage building to find out if they are rideable. No: four flat tires. Fife, with Will assisting, fixes three, but the fourth needs a new tube. Off to Jordan Bicycle shop with the bike wedged into the bunjee-strapped trunk. Back home with the repaired bike, we try to mount the impossible-to-configure bike rack on the car trunk, but succeed only in denting and scratching my car. An hour of adjusting the six, c- and s-clamped straps gets us nowhere: the rack collapses when the first bike is placed. Hrrrumph! Frustrated, but not ready to quit.

We change venues -- the neighborhood will do. Few sidewalks, so we're forced onto the street. Cars speed past us 20 miles over the speed limit; their drivers cast impatient looks our way. Look left-right-left-right; dart across the curvy road to the only available sidewalk. Heart races and the 24 year old mother reflex cranes my head back to check on Anna. Handlebars turn, following my head. Wobble. Older instincts control the bike: straighten, balance, glide. Now, dodge the broken Bud bottle. Did Anna see it too? Duck under that low-hanging Mulberry limb. Thwack. Puff the disturbed gnats off my nose and forehead. My head itches. Rubbing the neon helmet back and forth does not help. Straighten up to look for the woodpecker drilling a nearby Sycamore. Bump over the drainage cover in the middle of the sidewalk. Remember Diane crushing her right hand in a bike tumble last week. Lean over to grab the racing handle bars again. Relegated to watch sand, grass, cement, and asphalt rush past -- not exactly what I had envisioned.

Evaluation: Riding my childhood bike was as simple as hopping on in the carport and gliding down the driveway to the low-traffic street. No combination lock, no bubble-headed helmet, no gear, no ornery bike rack, no arthritis. Yes, of course, there was the occasional derailed chain and flat tire, but riding my bike to school, to the store, to a friend's house, to explore the neighborhood, or just to feel the wind on my face was functional, uncomplicated fun. Might have been fun today if the bike rack had not frustrated me so and if I had been pedaling my 1961 Western Flyer cruiser with a much nimbler 6 year old frame (mine, not the bike's).