Last summer we were in a hardware store and there was a fat tire tricycle on display, above the shelves of merchandise, red and big and ready to go. I asked the clerk to take it down. Keither hopped on, made a lap around the aisle and stopped at my feet. It was smooth rolling on that waxed tile floor. Everything in the store was in cool shadow, orderly and new. Outside the Sun was hot and the wind blowing.
I strapped the trike down with yellow cord we'd strewn in the truckbed. That yellow cord sure has come in handy. Straps everything down. My only concern was wondering where the negative was, what disaster could partially restrained yellow cord get into? I imagined it twisted around an axle, or catching a bit of metal from a passing motorist...but the only thing so far was at about 70mph one of the ends would rear up like a Cobra and sway a little bit in the wind at the end of the bed. I could watch it in fascination from the rear view mirror. What would a cop think? There must be a proviso about yellow cord in the rat's nest of laws and chains we tie ourselves down with.
But here I was strapping down a oversized trike as if it were a expensive mountain bike, or a ATV to be bolted in place. Just like the Big Dogs little trike, I told it. On the way home I'd glance at it occasionally, making sure it was still in place. Big and Red and Ready to go.
When we got home Keither tried the bike and then after about 3 feet stopped.
"Yeah," he said, and that was all.
"Keith, wow, look at this new bike, it's awesome, isn't it?"
"Yes Dad," He smiled at me. "Can we go watch Sponge Bob?"
The other big wheels we'd tried on the first two boys had mixed results. The gravel tore them to bits. You couldn't get traction in the loose mix with plastic wheels. Our patio was small, and this meant constant turning, which could get boring. You don't realize it when you live in the city, but some natural childhood forms of transportation, these rites of passage, need sidewalks to function. Boys learn how to ride a bike quicker with hundreds of yards of flat sidewalk to get a grip with. We had a summit of gravel in the drive and then you were off the hill and crashing through the fence. Trav did very well with both feet out on the mining roads, to steer and brake at the same time, but his was an athletic exception. I didn't want anyonelse to even try that. He got away with it because he was Trav, and could.
This trike was solid steel, with fat real rubber tires. The bright red paint actually was staying on, which is much better than the last two Radio Flyers. The patented secret formular Radio Red came off in your hands and in the first rains..and that wasn't all that was different. You could bend it with your bare hands. A single crash and that wagon was dented. The battleships of my youth were no more. This really was Cheap Chinese. But the red trike was built the old way, it was sturdy with real steel, and just raring to go.
But there was no one to make it go. I guess the window where a trike fits in is small anyway, and to have a vehicle able to take our unpaved roads means a certain amount of strength and size from the driver must be obtained. And that size is almost about ready to ride a bike anyway.
I'd miscalculated, alright. It was too hard for Keith to turn and drive with his short legs. So Big Red sat in our garage for a year. About a month ago I found Trav on it again. Trav could really make the thing move, even though his knees were knocking the handlebars. Recently during a gun review on another forum, I took a picture of Trav on that trike. When he found out I'd posted that he blushed red and almost burst into tears. It was so insulting to him he couldn't even express it, lest he seem even more immature and 'stupid' to me. Don't let anyone tell you childhood is not great, and also not a veil of tears. Luckily, there was a pict with Trav holding the Big Finn M39, so his ego was sufficiently bolstered by this knowledge that he was even able to eat dinner.
I saw Big Red's tires were almost flat, and this made it hard to push, so I pumped them up. With a sudden small light, I saw that Keith had grown and Big Red had gotten smaller. Tires filled with air had less resistance...Keith, Come Here!
And now I can't get Keith off Big Red. He rides over the bumps and gravel like a storm trooper. The design has never been our greatest accomplishment. It says something that either one less wheel or one more make the thing much safer, so much so they banned motorized off road versions, and now make only Quads for youngsters and adults.
But Keith is big enough now to master the almost turn-overs, and I feel OK with him wearing a helmet. Beside which, a helmet is just one more thing a cougar has to bite through to reach Essence of Keithy. There's a green frog squeaky horn, sounding just like a bath toy, mounted on the bars. We loved it, even the older boys, but Keith asked me to take it off. He was too big for that. And I was going to take it off, until his brothers chimed in that they wanted it on their bikes. After some reflection, Keither said they could all take turns having the horn, with his turn going first.
So what if it only lasts 6 months and cost me 60 bucks? A moment in time. That's all we get anyway. Everything wears out around us, and we shop like the dutiful WalMart citizens we are for new products to replace the old, measuring the time of our lives by broken toasters, bikes too small, and pans thrown away because the forever finish wasn't.
Big Red and Keith and his brothers and Big Finn and his Dad are often outside these late summer evenings, all riding bikes in our pitiful gravel summit, the munk family at the top of the hill and not yet out of time.
munk
I strapped the trike down with yellow cord we'd strewn in the truckbed. That yellow cord sure has come in handy. Straps everything down. My only concern was wondering where the negative was, what disaster could partially restrained yellow cord get into? I imagined it twisted around an axle, or catching a bit of metal from a passing motorist...but the only thing so far was at about 70mph one of the ends would rear up like a Cobra and sway a little bit in the wind at the end of the bed. I could watch it in fascination from the rear view mirror. What would a cop think? There must be a proviso about yellow cord in the rat's nest of laws and chains we tie ourselves down with.
But here I was strapping down a oversized trike as if it were a expensive mountain bike, or a ATV to be bolted in place. Just like the Big Dogs little trike, I told it. On the way home I'd glance at it occasionally, making sure it was still in place. Big and Red and Ready to go.
When we got home Keither tried the bike and then after about 3 feet stopped.
"Yeah," he said, and that was all.
"Keith, wow, look at this new bike, it's awesome, isn't it?"
"Yes Dad," He smiled at me. "Can we go watch Sponge Bob?"
The other big wheels we'd tried on the first two boys had mixed results. The gravel tore them to bits. You couldn't get traction in the loose mix with plastic wheels. Our patio was small, and this meant constant turning, which could get boring. You don't realize it when you live in the city, but some natural childhood forms of transportation, these rites of passage, need sidewalks to function. Boys learn how to ride a bike quicker with hundreds of yards of flat sidewalk to get a grip with. We had a summit of gravel in the drive and then you were off the hill and crashing through the fence. Trav did very well with both feet out on the mining roads, to steer and brake at the same time, but his was an athletic exception. I didn't want anyonelse to even try that. He got away with it because he was Trav, and could.
This trike was solid steel, with fat real rubber tires. The bright red paint actually was staying on, which is much better than the last two Radio Flyers. The patented secret formular Radio Red came off in your hands and in the first rains..and that wasn't all that was different. You could bend it with your bare hands. A single crash and that wagon was dented. The battleships of my youth were no more. This really was Cheap Chinese. But the red trike was built the old way, it was sturdy with real steel, and just raring to go.
But there was no one to make it go. I guess the window where a trike fits in is small anyway, and to have a vehicle able to take our unpaved roads means a certain amount of strength and size from the driver must be obtained. And that size is almost about ready to ride a bike anyway.
I'd miscalculated, alright. It was too hard for Keith to turn and drive with his short legs. So Big Red sat in our garage for a year. About a month ago I found Trav on it again. Trav could really make the thing move, even though his knees were knocking the handlebars. Recently during a gun review on another forum, I took a picture of Trav on that trike. When he found out I'd posted that he blushed red and almost burst into tears. It was so insulting to him he couldn't even express it, lest he seem even more immature and 'stupid' to me. Don't let anyone tell you childhood is not great, and also not a veil of tears. Luckily, there was a pict with Trav holding the Big Finn M39, so his ego was sufficiently bolstered by this knowledge that he was even able to eat dinner.
I saw Big Red's tires were almost flat, and this made it hard to push, so I pumped them up. With a sudden small light, I saw that Keith had grown and Big Red had gotten smaller. Tires filled with air had less resistance...Keith, Come Here!
And now I can't get Keith off Big Red. He rides over the bumps and gravel like a storm trooper. The design has never been our greatest accomplishment. It says something that either one less wheel or one more make the thing much safer, so much so they banned motorized off road versions, and now make only Quads for youngsters and adults.
But Keith is big enough now to master the almost turn-overs, and I feel OK with him wearing a helmet. Beside which, a helmet is just one more thing a cougar has to bite through to reach Essence of Keithy. There's a green frog squeaky horn, sounding just like a bath toy, mounted on the bars. We loved it, even the older boys, but Keith asked me to take it off. He was too big for that. And I was going to take it off, until his brothers chimed in that they wanted it on their bikes. After some reflection, Keither said they could all take turns having the horn, with his turn going first.
So what if it only lasts 6 months and cost me 60 bucks? A moment in time. That's all we get anyway. Everything wears out around us, and we shop like the dutiful WalMart citizens we are for new products to replace the old, measuring the time of our lives by broken toasters, bikes too small, and pans thrown away because the forever finish wasn't.
Big Red and Keith and his brothers and Big Finn and his Dad are often outside these late summer evenings, all riding bikes in our pitiful gravel summit, the munk family at the top of the hill and not yet out of time.
munk
