When you have a little one, who finally graduates their tricycle-riding days, you excitedly go to the store and pick out their first bike. It's new and shiny, and it screams BIG KID! It's complete with training wheels, maybe a bell, a basket, or a little seat in the back for their precious baby doll to ride around.
They ride that bike, head held high and proud, until, for whatever reason, the time comes to hang up the training wheels.
You may have a picture in your mind of what this may look like. Something like a happy child, grinning from ear to ear, pedaling with all their might, as a smiling parents trots along side, holding onto the seat. Until, miraculously, they announce, "I'm letting go!" And the child smoothly rides off down the sidewalk. Everyone cheers. Success.
Well...................
If you want to know the truth, you can pretty much take whatever I just said and imagine the complete opposite.
How it actually goes is something more like this:
If you are like our family, you have a bike curse on you. You just happen to purchase a bike with a defective pedal that unscrews as they ride, causing the entire pedal to fall off. Since your child does have the use of both legs and wants to pedal with both, you, once again, contact the company for new pedals. Finally, you get 2 good pedals. The child has a properly functioning bike for about a month before one of the training wheels breaks. As the child rides, it pushes up. So you take the plunge, remove the training wheels and try to teach her to ride without them. You hold up the bike as your near 50 pound child carefully balances their feet onto the pedals. As you grasp one hand onto the handle bars and the other behind the seat, simultaneously balancing the near 50 pound child, you begin to trot along, while pushing the bike. As the child pedals, the bike picks up speed, at which time, you are unable to keep up, so you let go. The child immediately topples over, with no major injury, but the child is still angry. In an angry tirade, the child rants something about hating the bike and not being able to do it, and somehow this is your fault. This continues for months until one freezing cold winter day, protected from falling by a bubble of snow suit, you get this:
By now, you have at least learned your lesson in purchasing bikes. The lesson: let someone else buy it. So your second child's grandparent generously purchases him a bike and has the store employee assemble it. Genius. We're golden, right.
Or you would be if the child watched where they were going instead of watching you.
We had about 6 months of bike riding bliss. A 6 year old who could now ride a 2-wheeler bike and a 5 year old with his brand new, store assembled bike with training wheels. Until, wouldn't you know, one of the training wheels, again, pushes up as he rides. Bike curse. We tighten it to no avail, until one day, I decide enough is enough, and I take off the training wheels. I tell him to start off by gliding down the small, grassy hill, no pedaling, just gliding and balancing. He does this a few times and feels comfortable. We go out onto the sidewalk, and again, I am balancing the weight of a near 50 pound child, running along side, this time 6 months pregnant, and hoping for the best. Of course, he falls, and he hates the bike, hates the road, hates life. But we press on amidst the screaming, the tears, the thrown bike and helmet. So far, this is where we're at with him:
I think I may just skip bike riding altogether with the next two children. It isn't really a skill one needs to be successful in life, now is it? I guess it would limit their ability to be a bike messenger, compete in the Tour de Franc or live in China. Lots of people ride bikes in China, right? I don't know.
So there you have it. The joy of teaching your child to ride a bike.
No comments:
Post a Comment