What’s something most people don’t know about you?
Summer vacations were a joy. Mum had us finish our holiday homework at the beginning of the vacations and she even had us do a little extra every year to ensure we were always in touch with the concept of learning. But the year I turned 11, Mum decided that I would not be wasting away my time running on the streets and playing hide and seek, I was going to learn to ride a bicycle. Back in the day, we could hire bicycles at nominal rates for the entire month. The cycle shop would rent out the cycles and would maintain them, but if there were any damages to the bicycles when we were using them, then we would have to pay for the repairs. I don’t know if we signed any documents, but word-of-mouth was a sufficient guarantee.
We lived on 11th B cross and the roads in my locality were structured around a grid consisting of approximately 10-12 plots. Most of these plots were not developed, so they were just random fields with a fence around them. The roads had been paved and as is the case in most developing localities, the utilities team would come and dig up the roads to lay underground cables and wires and sanitation lines. So, the streets I used to run through were always filled with potholes and speed breakers making them relatively safer for us to play on, as vehicles could not drive through fast. I had learned to ride the smaller bicycles and had refused to try the bigger cycles even when my legs were too long for the smaller ones. So, Mum had decided to ensure that I graduated to the bigger rims this vacation.
We used to hire the cycles at the start of the vacations and would keep them for a few days. Mum ensured that we only hired the cycles when we had nothing else planned and we returned the cycles if we were out for an entire day. I remember Mum walking with us to the store to hire the bicycles and while she took care of the payment, we would select the cycles. That year, there was a new model of cycles at the store – these were slightly smaller, with an 18-inch rim and a seat that came with an attached backrest, making it seem like a throne more than a cycle seat. For some reason, this cycle appealed to me, but Mum was insistent that I learn on the bigger 20-inch or even the 22-inch rims and then return the cycle to borrow the one I had set my mind on the ride for the rest of the vacation.
I picked the cycle Mum wanted me to learn to ride and stomped back home. What I did not know then, but which I found out much later was that I would enjoy cycling and may never be interested in riding a smaller bicycle again. But Mum was well aware of it. She ran behind me almost non-stop the entire morning. It was a hot day. Absolutely still. The skies were a pastel blue and clear. The streets were uneven. They had been paved at some point and then had been dug and opened up to lay pipes and then covered in mud which worked like speed breakers.
“Don’t look at the wheel. Sit straight and look ahead. And keep pedaling. Turn the handle in the direction you want to go,” she huffed into my ear while she ran beside me in her sari, tucked haphazardly around her waist so she could move with ease. The first two rounds were the most chaotic- she was running by my side, holding onto the seat while I tried to pedal and look up ahead at the same time. It was such a complicated concept, two instructions to be followed simultaneously – the start of multi-tasking, I guess. On the third round, she let go of the seat while I was pedaling downhill but kept shouting out the instructions, so I had no clue that she was not two steps behind me. As I reached the intersection and had to turn, I fumbled and when I did not find her next to me to steady me, I panicked. She yelled out the instructions, but the panic was very real. I turned the handle hard and flew off the cycle.
That was when I realized that I was not aerodynamic. I had bones that were heavy – not hollow, so I would never be able to fly. And the closest I would ever come to it was when I was on that cycle riding downhill. And that is a feeling I have continued to nurture all my life. I have not forgotten that feeling of wind in my hair, my clothes flapping around me, the muscles in my legs relaxing after the exertion of pedaling uphill, tears streaming down my face as the wind hit my face, the road rushing past. That joy. The exhilaration of it all.
The scraped knees that day were forgotten. I remember my eyes filling with tears when I saw the scrapes, but what I registered was Mum’s excitement that I had cycled on my own down the longest stretch of the road. I blinked away the tears, gingerly pulled myself up, and looked miserably at the cycle that looked tangled beyond belief. Mum just pulled it up, turned the handle around, and handed it to me, instructing me to get on it and ride again. “Falling off the cycle is not under your control, but what you do after falling off is very important,” she said as she gently coaxed me to extend my injured knees to start pedaling again.
It was tough; this stretch of the road was straight and short, and there was a turn that I would have to navigate. But I got on that cycle and pedaled through the pain, took the turn slow, and pedaled through the incline, and then, as the road curved, I headed back to the same spot I had attempted to fly over. Riding past Mum as she grinned and waved me off, turning to walk home alone, her task completed.
Even today, I trudge through the toughest parts of life, looking for that curve from where everything is pure exhilaration. Most people know that I work hard, some have noticed that I am at it non-stop, and a few others know I never give up, but there are only a handful who know that I do it all over and over again to enjoy that thrill. The joy of having the wind hit your face, hair streaming behind you, clothes flapping in the wind, legs relaxing, enjoying the fruits of labor, hearing Mum’s voice in the distance hollering, “Keep looking ahead. Keep pedaling. Don’t look at the handle. Just turn it in the direction you want to go,” a smile lighting up her face, a glint of victory in her eyes. 3 down. 1 to go. She thinks.
Just a little more 