A woman in my college dorm at CU did not know how to ride a bike. I thought it was highly bizarre and almost scandalous she never learned. I believed her parents failed her on some very deep level. They provided food, clothing, and shelter…but not the training to balance on a banana seat and two wheels with Hoyle playing cards stuck in the spokes.

She never knew the joy of loading a plastic basket slung over the handlebar with dandelions and an alarmed toad from the neighborhood duck pond. She never careened around a corner at the bottom of a heart-poundingly steep hill and felt her tires slip out from under her because of the algae in the gutter. Oh, the places she didn’t go, the shoelaces she didn’t wind in the gears, the lifetime scars from spectacular wipe-outs she can’t use as a conversational piece.

But, for the grace of God, will go my children.

Our former neighborhood was not bicycle friendly. The street was busy and there were always a lot of cars parked along the sidewalks. The idea of teaching wobbly young children to dodge cars both moving and parked genuinely scared hubby and I, so when the question of “when can we learn to ride our bikes?” came up, we always told them someday, when we moved.

We moved and now live in a much safer neighborhood to learn the art of bicycle riding. Unfortunately, our delay meant poor Aidan and Ryley have now passed the point of learning balance easily. There seems to be a window of opportunity between too young and too old and they are right on the border of being on the crotchety side. Plus they have enough life experience to know Crashing + Street + Elbows + Knees = Very Very Bad.

On Labor Day, the seven of us walked down to our neighborhood park, armed with knowledge culled from an article I found online, entitled How To Learn to Ride a Bike in 15 Minutes. Aidan, Ryley, and Sam walked with their helmets strapped on. They pushed their bikes. Everyone was ridiculously excited, including hubby and I. We were fulfilling an important part of our parental obligation, finally, and it felt good that within 15 or 20 minutes my kids would join the ranks of good balancers and circus dogs.

We got to the park and the hill especially picked out for the occasion. We helped the kids poise themselves on the top of the hill and gave them instructions. “GO!” we shouted. Tommy and Joel clapped their encouragement.

Nobody moved. All three of them looked down the hill, looked at each other, and looked at us. Hubby and I looked at each other. “Who’s going first?” I prodded, weakly.

It was too scary. We moved to a less frightening slope and tried again. This time, Sam was determined to go first. I ran alongside him down the hill and was impressed with his balance. Aidan and Ryley followed with hubby and I trotting alongside, but they had a much harder time balancing and were more fearful.

“15 minutes to Biking Fun” decayed into “90 minutes to Screaming, Crying, Frustration, Grass Stains, and Skid Marks”.

They were sincerely surprised they couldn’t simply sit on their bikes, pedal, and find themselves in Paris wearing a yellow jersey.

Despite comical bike riding demonstrations from hubby and I and pep talks that seemed lofty at the time but futile in retrospect, the point came when we realized they were too dejected to keep trying. We walked the bikes home. None of the kids have mentioned going out again. Their bikes are hanging by hooks in the garage like metallic and rubber catches of the day and I am starting to detect the iffy smell of regret.

We will try again, perhaps this weekend.