Sweet Memories

The pedaling of an old man riding a wide-tire bicycle grabs my attention as I drive Acoma road. The methodical around and around of the bike’s wheels is mesmerizing.  I press the car brakes, slow to a crawl and drop back, to give the senior space, as we approach the corner stop.

He wears red Keds, and a large droopy straw hat shades his face from the morning sun. He sports a long sleeve plaid shirt and hazardous baggy Dockers. The blue and chrome fender bike has no basket or hand brakes.

Behind him rides a man in a metallic Speedo shirt, and black skin-tight shorts.  He wears a helmet and mustache, and he does not pass abruptly. Instead, he moves to coast gently beside the elder, a solid traffic barrier.  They ease the corner, two abreast, like dancing a Minuet synchronized to Chopin. I stop at the corner. . . rather than go straight. I turn right. . . and follow them, absorbed in their relationship.

They are a pair. Paternal. Their head, back, and shoulders are a younger/older version, of the other.  The son deliberately peddles ahead, never looks back, but hoovers; and allows his father to ride independently. The old man’s bike wheels don’t wobble. The handlebars do not shake. There is an air of pride accompanying his movement.

As they resume their single file adventure, I drive by, see his wrinkled face, and guess the elder is eighty. I catch a glimpse of the son’s full head of peppered gray hair, and face with minimal expression lines, when passing, and guess . . . he’s nearing sixty.

My mind conjures a past Father’s Day,

I imagine it is 1958, the father wears the same plaid shirt, Dockers and Keds. The son, is dressed in jeans and a white t-shirt. The father, leads the way with subtle protectiveness and allows the son to celebrate his newly acquired skill, riding a bike.

“Daddy, look at me!” He yells with a big smile.

Today is Father’s Day 2012. I watch the pair celebrate with the simple act of being together. Pedaling their bicycles, and needing each other in a different way.

 . . . just saying

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*Post was originally published in 2012, over ten years ago on claudiajustsaying.wordpress.com