12

I got a new bike this weekend. Well, not new exactly, but new to me. It’s shiny and hot pink, and very, very cool.

I haven’t ridden a bicycle since I was 15. I guess since I got my driver’s license on my 16th birthday. Who in her right mind would pedal a bike when she could be flying down the highways in a 65 Karmann Ghia? So, I sold my 10 speed in a garage sale and considered myself to be grown up. Everyone with a cute car is automatically an adult when you’re 16.

Now I drive an SUV or a minivan. I don’t think you can get any further away from that first cute and sexy car. It doesn’t matter how great your SUV is, once you arrive with 5 children in tow you’re no longer cute unless you’re Angelina Jolie.

So this weekend I reclaimed my freedom. I had forgotten the feeling of flying you get when you coast down a hill and the wind whips through your hair. You get to be twelve again. Speeding around the neighborhood on a ride with Little Kid #1, the 11 year old, I feel less her mother and more her friend. She shouts and laughs and is free with me in ways that she no longer is as a girl on the cusp of womanhood with her mom. We’re just two girls racing along in the sunshine and racing the world.

If you haven’t ridden a two wheeler lately, I recommend it. There are so few places of pure joy and absolute freedom once you’re a grown-up, but you’ll find your childhood waiting for you behind those handlebars.