The only photo I found is to the left in the collage below. I probably got it for my 5th birthday. I've been trying to remember if I had a tricycle before it, but cannot find any evidence that I did. Then it struck me that until I was nearly five, we lived in a flat in town, and maybe it was not practical or safe for me to have one there. And by the time we moved out to the village, I was too big for a tricycle, but still too young for the "grown-up" kind... So this was probably considered a compromise.
The one on the right is of my first "proper" bicycle, from when I was 10. I seem to recall it took me a while to learn to ride that one; but by the time I was willing to pose with it for a photo, I was probably also able to use it!
From my drawing (also in the photo album), it is made clear that one of my favourite places to cycle to was 'the libbrary'... (deliberately misspelled here to reflect that I had not yet learned the Swedish word correctly: biblioteket...)
I think I also usually cycled to school (in grade 4-6). The school (and also the library) was around 2 km away (at 'the other end' of the spread out village where I lived). Before I learned to cycle, I had to walk. Except in winter, because then we (a bunch of us who lived in the same neighbourhood) got to go by taxi. I have no photo of that, but it looked like an old big black London cab. I suppose our parents preferred that solution to have us out walking and cycling on the main road in snow and ice.
From grade 7 onwards, I went to school in town, and then we went by bus.
you look so cute, and serious with the first bike... I got a bike when I was 8 or 9 and struggled to ride it. back then I thought I was dumb. now I know I have balance issues and all the things I could not do were because of that. I tried skating and fell over and over, bike same way. no jungle gym either, or walking on balance beams. I could swing though. ha ha
ReplyDeleteThanks Sandra. I always had balance issues like that as well. Also got easily seasick and carsick and whatever. Actually I never even liked swings very much!
DeleteI like the first bike but it must have been a challenge going around corners.
ReplyDeleteGraham, oddly I cannot remember any problems of that kind - but I guess if I ran into difficulties I could just put my feet down. And I probably wasn't allowed to go beyond the corners of "our" street on it anyway!
DeleteI have never seen or heard of a bike like this, a combination of two different kinds!! What cute pictures, you look adorable!
ReplyDeleteGinny, now I come to think of it, I'm not sure if I've seen many others like it, either. (I probably wouldn't notice. To me they would not seem odd simply because I once had one.)
DeleteWe mostly walked to school, I didn't get my first bike until I was about 8 years old, it was a hand me down from a cousin that I had to share with my sister.
ReplyDeleteAmy, as I was the oldest child of "my generation" in my family, I had no one to inherit things from like that.
DeleteMy school was close enough to walk to, so that cycling was only for fun; either just riding along the paths on the fields where I go running nowadays, or to the public swimming pool in the next small town.
ReplyDeleteFun memories, thank you for sharing them! And I can very much see you in the photo where you are about 10.
Meike, other people's memories do tend to stir up a lot of our own, don't they!
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