akirlu | Childhood Freedom Lives in Kent (Reply)

A while back, in the context of some kid-centered movie or other,

mrissa observed that the film was essentially a period piece because it included a herd of kids getting on their bikes and using them to actually get somewhere they all wanted to go, as opposed, I guess, to just riding loops around the local cul-de-sac. The claim didn't ring true to me at the time. I was reminded of it again this weekend, as I saw various clusters of kids riding their bikes together near my street and over by the park with the baseball fields. Down by the skateboard park you often see bikes parked around the periphery, skaters obviously having ridden them to get themselves and their boards to the park. So maybe other places have grown too paranoid or too blandly suburban for kids to take off on their bikes for kid-type adventures without adult supervision, but in Kent it still happens. Chalk up another reason why I like it.