I\u2019m ready for a girl\u2019s bike. It\u2019s been a long journey, from my first two-wheeler to this point. And, I better act fast or I won\u2019t be able to find one. Girls don\u2019t ride girl\u2019s bikes! Not anymore. Old men ride girl\u2019s bikes. Two years ago I discovered that I threw like a girl (sounds like a sexist statement, but I\u2019m just reporting the facts). I was tossing a football back and forth with my granddaughter, Oriah, who was 8 years old at the time. I threw as hard as I could, but most throws were landing two feet in front of her. All her throws made it to me; some sailed over my head. I don\u2019t play catch anymore; someone watching might say, \u201cHe throws like a girl.\u201d My granddaughter moved on; she plays with kids who don\u2019t throw like a girl.<\/p>\n
Yes, a girl\u2019s bike is looming in my future. They are so much easier to get on and off. I will no longer embarrass myself, falling off when I try to swing my leg over the bar to dismount and then rise from a tangle on the ground like a newborn colt standing for the first time. When I climb off a girl\u2019s bike it will be as smooth as silk. Of course I\u2019ll lie about it, \u201cIt\u2019s my wife\u2019s bike,\u201d I\u2019ll say. \u201cMine\u2019s in the shop.\u201d No different than when I tell Oriah my arm is too sore to play catch.<\/p>\n
I hope my new bike will inspire my age mates to join me; then I won\u2019t stand out so much. I started the long journey to a girl\u2019s bike when I was seven and had to stand on the curb to get my leg over the bar on my first bike. Besides the bar issue, that bike was too big. Everything we got in that era was too big. \u201cYou\u2019ll grow into it,\u201d we were told. We didn\u2019t reside on a pedestal, like today\u2019s kids. We stuffed wadded up newspaper in the toes of new shoes to get them to fit. We rolled up the cuffs on a new pair of dungarees (now called jeans). We swam around in coats and shirts. And, new bikes were mounted from a curb. When I first started, my sister held my bike steady while I got on, and then rode ahead to catch me when I came to a stop.<\/p>\n
I never understood the boy\u2019s bike – girl\u2019s bike thing. Why couldn\u2019t both of them have a bar a person could easily swing their leg over? Then \u201cGoogle\u201d informed me that the first \u201cgirl\u2019s\u201d bicycle was created in the late 1800\u2019s, an era when women wore full-length dresses. Bicycles were a common form of transportation back then (a bike was a lot easier to take care of than a horse). The bar was lowered, so to speak, and the rear wheel was enclosed in a skirt guard so a dress wouldn\u2019t become tangled in the spokes. It\u2019s an idea that\u2019s gone out of fashion. Equality has moved into the bike word. And why not? Women are allowed to wear pants, something that wasn\u2019t done back then. What a wild time we live in!<\/p>\n
A \u201cboy\u2019s\u201d bike, with its high bar, has a stronger frame. Girl\u2019s bicycles aren\u2019t recommended for rugged trails because of their weaker structure. That won\u2019t bother me when I get mine. The only rough terrains I\u2019ll encounter are the uneven, slate, sidewalk slabs in the village. A running start will get me over most of them. If I\u2019m forced to stop and go around, I won\u2019t fall getting off, because it will be a GIRL\u2019S BIKE!<\/p>\n
Complaints. Questions. Send to mlessler7@gmail.com.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I\u2019m ready for a girl\u2019s bike. It\u2019s been a long journey, from my first two-wheeler to this point. And, I better act fast or I…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-49024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\n