Last night I rode a cool old cruiser with a seat that lacked any padding at all. But I didn't care. There's something great about riding a bike on a hot, so hot, summer night: it's called instant breeze. I rattled around on this old bike hoping nothing would break, feeling like a reckless driver without a seat belt on. A few visions of spaghetti sauce colored knees and mangled feet passed through my mind, but I soon let them go. It just wasn't likely I'd fall. Somehow I had faith in this old bike that my dad had proudly proclaimed, "kept air in its tires!"
Riding around on the country roads near my childhood home I became ageless. I knew if anyone saw me they wouldn't be able to tell my age. I look young anyway, but especially on a hot summer night, riding around giddily on a bike. Only kids do that sort of thing. Right?
Huge 4x4 trucks (the standard ride in small town America) rambled past me, not slowing down, but thankfully scooting over to the other side of the road. Families sat outside on their small patches of green bermuda grass, enjoying the almost tolerable heat the evening and shade trees brought. I passed a tractor, but was mostly watching the horses across the street. Munching on tall grass, they looked serene, almost bored. A tiny donkey made me smile.
Near the end of my ride, the bike fell apart a bit, becoming more rickety and jangling around as I spun the wheels with my pumping. I sounded like I was driving the old Chevy from the yard rather than this engineless machine; front fender scraping on the tire and creating sparks as the rubber warmed. (Okay, they were tiny pebbles flying off the tire, but they really looked like sparks.)
Guess it's time I learned how to fix up a bike.
On my way back home I passed my lifelong neighbor's house. The tradition when passing each other's homes is to honk our car horns as if to say, "Hi, neighbor!" As I passed, I hollered out, "beep beep beep beep beep!!!" feeling silly and happy all at once, my ridiculously loud bike probably announcing my presence more than my yelling.
It wasn't until I got home, sweat trickling down my back and making my glasses slide down my nose, that I saw the name of the bike.
Free Spirit.
Perfect.

Space Travel

I know there is no such thing as time travel, but what I just did comes as close to it as anything I can imagine. Last week I moved from Los Angeles to a town of 5,000 in the hot Northern California valley. And let me tell you--it's a different world. In one day I went from the diverse, smog drenched vibrance of L.A. to the dry, simple, yellowed fields of nowhereville. Of course, I welcome the simplicity of huge and plentiful parking spots with no meters and a grocery store with short lines and baggers that sweetly ask if you'd like "help out" to your car, regardless of the items or weight of what you've bought. But in those same grocery stores I've had to eat my words.
It was just several days ago that I was reassuring my dad during a serious discussion of the state of the earth that MY generation of young mothers and fathers was having a revolution. "We are growing our own food, bringing our own bags to the store and avoiding plastic toys as much as possible," I said brightly, proud of 'my people.' He didn't seem so sure. Now, having grocery shopped in this very small town, in which I grew up, I know why. Because it's not true. Because in small towns like this all over the country there are just as many processed foods and plastic bottled water buyers as ever. And they aren't bringing their own bags to the store. Far from it.

I had been excited to think that my friends and I were the majority, the happy future of living wisely on this planet. Disappointingly, it only took seven minutes in the supermarket line (this one was long because someone's food stamp card wasn't working. Embarrassing.) to realize my friends and I are among the "green elite." It ain't the real world.
This backwards experience at the grocery store is only part of the time warp of small town life. I'm the only Prius in town, nothing is organic, and though we are surrounded by farms and orchards, strike me down if you can find locally sourced food for sale. I haven't seen any.
Sigh...
Is it worth easy parking and going to a bank where all the tellers know your whole family lineage to deal with the otherwise archaic ways of living in a small town? Don't think I will be here for long.