My First Bike Had a Wooden Wheel

A Tale Of Lost Freedom

It’s true. My first bicycle had a wooden rim. I was nine when I acquired my first bike in trade for hours worked. My uncle and I cleaned out a barn for a friend of my grandmother’s. The woman had just bought the building, which was an inn. Instead of the ten dollars I had earned, I asked to take the bicycle we had discovered in the barn. I can’t imagine my shy self speaking up like that, and I suspect it was my uncle’s idea. I’m sure he did most of the talking. But I wanted the bicycle, and the inn owner said sure.

I was so proud of that bike. It was a little too tall for me, and it was old. My father showed me the rear rim. It was wood. Wooden fingers were glued together to form a visible joint. He told me the bicycle was old, like from the 1920s or 30s. I didn’t care. It was mine, it worked, and I’d earned it.

I painted it construction orange. The same orange the state highway trucks used. I don’t know why we had that particular paint, but we did, and I didn’t have money to buy anything else. It was brush-paint, too.

I stripped the bike down to its frame, removing the handlebar, wheels, and seat. Then I sanded all the rust off that I could. I even used some cola to help because I’d heard cola was good for removing rust. It fizzed, and some rust came off on a rag, so I assumed it worked, at least a little. When the frame was ready, I meticulously brushed on that bright orange paint. I also painted the rims because I couldn’t have a wooden rim getting wet, and of course, the front, which was metal, had to match.

The bike was as good as new. Shiny. Very Orange.

At nine, my parents didn’t allow me to ride the bike on the road. We lived on a main route with heavy traffic. So I rode the bike in the yard. As big as it was, the yard wasn’t enough. My sister and I, and my father, as he worked the gardens, tramped paths around our property. It was only just over an acre, but the paths provided a place for me to stretch my rides into adventures.

A forest bordered three sides of our land, and my sister and I had forged a few paths into the woods. The…

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