Your bike is a discovery; your bike is freedom. It doesn’t matter where you are when you are in the saddle; you’re taken away.
-Doug Donaldson
Do you remember being fifteen years old in June? School is out. No homework, no rising early to catch the bus that transported farm kids to town The warm hazy days stretch out before you in a long line of possibilities.
At fifteen, I was too young to work in the canning factory and too young to drive. Too old to play with Barbies. Too far out in the country to walk to a friend’s house. Chores took up some of the time, but not all. Mom and Dad were too busy to drive me into town to see my friends. A bike was my only mode of transportation, but I’d outgrown the blue bike I got for my seventh birthday.
An ugly brown monstrosity leaned against the wall of the musty smelling tool shed—my brother’s bike. He was twenty-one and owned his own car. The bike was there for the taking. However, I had to stand on one leg and swing the other over the center bar when I wanted to mount the bike. In order to stop, I had to leap off like jumping a moving hurdle, which made for an awkward landing. Unfortunately, that bike is just a memory, but I found a discarded bike on the side of the road in almost the same condition.Your bike is a discovery; your bike is freedom. It doesn’t matter where you are when you are in the saddle; you’re taken away.
Doug Donaldson
Do you remember being fifteen years old in June? School is out. No homework, no rising early to catch the bus that transported farm kids to town The warm hazy days stretch out before you in a long line of possibilities.
My friend Lois also had free time. We had a lot in common—both the youngest child in a family of much older siblings. My brother was six years older and my sister nine. Lois’s brother was seven years older and her sisters were already out of the house. We were petite, almost the shortest girls in our high school class. We noticed the humor in every situation, Consequently, we were more likely to laugh than get angry when things went wrong. Lois’s laugh was contagious, so I had to join in.
One day we decided to go bike riding. I rode the five miles to Friesland, where Lois lived. My route took me past the Lindert’s with three teen aged boys in residence. I rode SL-O-O-OWLY, hoping to catch a glimpse of one of them outside. My big crush was Ron, the youngest son, with his red hair and cute smile, but his older brothers would have were made my heart beat a little faster as well.
We mounted our bikes and rode down shady country roads. The sun was heating up and the cool darkness soothed our overheated brows. We zoomed back into the bright sunlight. Shadows of clouds drifted across the corn fields creating a moving checkerboard. The lingering scent of wild flowers blanketing the ditches surrounded us.
Hard pedaling took us to the top of a steep hill. My bike had no gears, so going uphill got harder the higher I went. When I crested the top, I felt a twinge of fear as I looked down. The bottom seemed far away on that roller coaster hill. Lois cruised ahead. It was now or never. I pushed off.
The wind rushed in my face with the force of a thousand fans. I felt weightless as a bird soaring on an air current. The fear grew fainter until it was swallowed completely by the exhilaration of defying gravity. I did it! I swooped down the hill and lived!
Our quest for romance took us past farms where the cute guys lived. We had hopes of glimpsing one of the handsome farm boys, maybe working shirtless in a field near the road. We slowed our pedaling to a standstill in the hopes of a chance flirtation. No luck— the back and white cows grazing in the pasture didn’t even look up despite our best efforts at scintillating conversation.
How can I describe the freedom I felt that summer? No worries about getting good grades in math and science. No one judging my performance on my bike. Independence from parents and school schedules. Just my good friend and me off on an adventure of our own choosing.
When hunger and thirst drove us homeward, we biked back to Friesland. My memory is foggy about where we bought our sustenance. Was it at the grocery store or Teena Tamminga’s little penny candy shop? I remember sitting in the cool shade of a tree sharing sweet red licorice, salty Frito corn ships, and drinking an ice-cold bottle of Pepsi! Enjoying the carbonated bubbles as they slid down my throat. Talking and laughing. So what if we didn’t see any guys? We had frivolity, freedom, and friendship. Deep down I knew the possibility of encountering any of my crushes was remote. What would happen if I did? Not much romance for a sweaty girl on an ugly boy’s brown bike. But the possibility was always there, driving me to pedal a little faster.
I never had another summer like it. Once I turned sixteen, I went to work in the canning factory. I needed money for school clothes and college. Back to schedules and judgements
I don’t ride bikes anymore. Ever since my reverse shoulder replacement surgery, I’m afraid of falling. Damage to my arm would be terrible. I don’t want to go through that again. My bike hangs from the rafters in the garage like a ghostly reminder of summers long past. I own a grey ladies’ mountain bike, so I can daintily dismount. It has more gears the cats have lives, but I only used three—slow, slower and slowest.
Lois is still my good friend. Her laugh is as inviting as ever. We’ve come so far in life from those carefree summer days. I like to think there’s still a hint of the girl I was beneath the wrinkles. Lois surely has the same adventurous spirit—going on a Rhine River cruise a few weeks ago, traveling to Belize on a mission trip last spring, and driving alone from Ypsilanti, Michigan, to Wisconsin. Her husband, a diabetic, was ill for twenty years and Lois valiantly took care of him, including managing his feeding tube by herself. She won a local Woman of the Year award. She is one of the bravest persons I know.
Summer days still beckon. Time is all too fleeting, so we have to move before we no longer can. Two legs have replaced two wheels, but Pepsi is just as bubbly and Fritos still salty and crunchy. Where did I hide that red licorice?
Janice Detrie 