farewell, sweet ride

We had a slight bit o' drama at the homestead this weekend.
Lizzy wanted to go outside, so Matt took her out. She wanted to go on the playground -- no, she wanted to ride her bike! To the playground! Matt said, let's not get your bike out. Let's just go play. That's the last I heard -- the next thing I knew, Matt was coming inside, saying that Lizzy's little plastic three-wheeled bike, a 2-year-old gift from Grandma and Grandpa Williams, had been stolen. It appears that, as he predicted, Lizzy started riding toward the playground, then abandoned interest in the bike project and just walked across the grass. So they left the bike just behind our fence, in the common area, in full view of the playground, where they played. But while they were distracted, the bike somehow rode away... Our knee-jerk reaction was that someone flat-out swiped it, but that hasn't seemed to be a problem in this neighborhood. People have problems understanding how and when to put trash out -- our sense (and the HOA's sense) of what is appropriate in that regard is quite a bit different than what appears to the be general feeling, and I'm told it has been so for years and years by a previous resident friend -- but thieves, not really. Matt floated the theory that, well, the bike was sort of placed near a public garbage can -- perhaps it's possible that someone mistook it for trash. In the 10 to 15 minutes that it was there, at nearly dusk. I'd much rather believe that than that someone would take it. Matt and I strolled around the neighborhood looking for kids who might be playing with it right away, but whoever it was made a clean getaway.
(photo from toys r us -- no one we know. as you might have guessed.)

Cut to tonight. Matt called me away from my post in front of The Lion King 1 1/2 (yes, there is such a thing) with Lizzy to look out the window at the playground. A couple of kids were playing with what appeared to be Lizzy's bike! Surprise, surprise. Matt went out to ask them about it. Perhaps it wasn't worth the effort; we've had the bike for a year and a half, and it's really not worth a battle. We kind of wanted to get to the bottom of things, though. The small kid who was on the bike told him his "older brother" found it in the trash. a-HA! The suspicious thing, though, was that -- in a moment of parental smart-aleckiness -- we purchased a license plate for the thing that said SPOILED. And it had been removed. I suppose the non-English-speaking folks who took the bike might've preferred the plate gone, but it raises the suspicion level a little... The kids insisted that the bike had been found over THERE, not over THERE, where Matt was pointing. Okay. That's fine. We really don't care that much. To me, it's just an interesting difference of cultural interpretation, probably made worse by the fact that the "older brother" appeared to be about 6 years old. I don't mean to be judgmental or skeptical, but it makes me wonder when a bike that's left vaguely near a trash can -- not in a dumpster, not in the usual curbside trash spots the evening before a trash pick-up day, say -- can be interpreted as trash. Seems a bit convenient.

My favorite part of this story is that, after Matt went out to inquire as to the origins of the bike they all ended up concluding that, fine, the boys could go ahead and have it -- the boy said, "Well, it needs batteries! Do you have any batteries?" (we splurged on the model that has an ignition sound, and lights up and plays tunes as you ride along. But over the winter, the batteries died.) Apparently, if we once owned the bike, and had "thrown it away," we owed the next owners a fully-functioning model. Matt's response: "Go ask your brother for batteries." Maybe we should leave some out by the garbage can. Heh.

The important thing, to me, is that Lizzy didn't notice the bike tonight, and doesn't seem to care much. There will probably come a moment when she wants to ride, and doesn't have the bike, and might make a fuss. My bike was stolen when we lived in Schenectady, N.Y. -- one of those killer banana seat models -- when I was 7 or 8, and that really felt like a violation and a loss. It's good that she hasn't reacted that way. And, really -- I know that those kids need a toy more than Lizzy does. Granted, a bike is a nice thing to have, but she needs an extra toy like she needs a hole in her sweet, pony-tailed head.