The Littelest Bike In The Whole Wide World

9 Dec

I’ve been scanning in more slides from Dad’s camera. There are some interesting photos in this batch. This one, in particular, brought forth a vivid memory from over 40 years ago.


Me On The Littelest Bike

Here it is a lovely Spring day and I am out riding my bike for the benefit of dad’s lens. Note the protruding rebellious tongue. No doubt an external display of my thoughts on dad inflicting his hobby on me.

Notice how I am, shall we say, a bit big for this bike. It’s still quite ride-able and I was happy with it. At least until some of the other kids in the neighborhood noticed the size of my bike compared to their larger ones. Yes even at the age of 6 boys instinctively know that size matters.

So for the next eternity or so any time I was out on my bike I would be razzed by whoever else was out on their bikes (usually a group of three or four) with the chant “he’s got the the littelest bike in the whole wide world.” This lovely bit of 6 year old poetry was repeated over and over till the desired effect was attained. Namely me leaving, to the laughter and chants of “he’s got the the littelest bike in the whole wide world” to my rapidly retreating back.

Fortunately my parents noticed my distress. Dragged the reason for the distress out of me and eventually got me a nice new red Schwinn (with a bell and everything, golly!). I still remember the looks on their faces: envy and dissapointment that they lost a target for taunting. But most of all I remember the silence. The glorious silence. Now I had the newest and shiniest bike and it was just as big as all the others. And again just one of the guys.