Team Gray!

Joy has outgrown the bike she just learned how to ride a few months ago.

One day, on one of those rides down the street, Joy and Imani stopped to talk to Mr. Mel, who was outside waxing his car. When they didn’t come right back home, I rode over there to see where they were.

They were telling Mr. Mel all about what has been going on, and asking thousands of questions about waxing cars. As I gently urged the girls to come on home, Mr. Mel stopped us and ran into the garage. He came out with Big Joy’s old bike, a shiny green 5 speed. He suggested that it might be time for Imani to move up to a bigger bike. I thought her bike was just fine, thank you, but Imani took one look at that new bike and had to have it.

She promptly got on the bike and rode away. I thought it looked a little big, but she was determined to make this cool new bike hers. Mr. Mel and Imani tried to convince Joy to take Imani’s *old* bike. Joy tried it for a minute, but was clearly uncomfortable.

That was ok with me, and I didn’t force her to move on until she was ready.

Today, I watched her riding around, knees poking out at right angles to the side of her bike. She looked like a giant on that tiny bike. I asked her if she wanted to try the bigger bike. She hemmed and hawed, not really answering.

I thought maybe I could raise her seat, but when Joy rode closer to me, I could see that the seat was as high as it would go.

So I pushed the issue, and brought the bike out for Joy. The seat had already been lowered all the way for Joy. Her main concern had been that the big bike’s seat was too high. It was perfect today. While Joy was apprehensive to ride down the driveway, she got enthusiastic about the bigger bike the more she rode. She started out saying things like,”I can ride faster on my other bike.” I kept asking her questions about that. Was she sure?

By the time we quit riding, Joy was happy to make the switch. “See how fast I go on this bike!” “The hand brake stopped the bike, Mommy.”

And when I asked if she wanted to keep that bike in the garage, or the other bike, she said, “I want to keep this bike in the garage!” Enough said.

Daddy likes to joke that he’s fine for over 69. How about 73? It’s hard to believe my father is into his 70s. Longevity runs in his family–if you don’t die young. So, most of the folks who were going to die younger would have been dead by Daddy’s age. He’s running with the long-lifers, I suspect. His mother lived to be 96. His uncle just died last year at 107. Happy birthday, Daddy. May you have many many many more!

I called myself watching this movie, Pride on Friday night. The thing is, it was too late for me to watch, and I missed the best part of it. So I watched it last night with Yanni and Xay.

We loved it!

To have been black and involved in swimming at all and then watch this movie, you wonder ‘where has it been all my life?’

We were watching to see if those folks could really swim. And the underwater shots were pretty conclusive. You could see bubbles streaming out of the swimmers’ nose and mouths. It was beautiful.

And there was also the racism, and the bleak ghetto landscape. We don’t live in a world where white people refuse to swim with black people any more. But that was very real. And the movie also shows a progression from the 60s to the 70s, when the white swimmers would compete with the black swimmers, but not in the ghetto pool. Coach Jim Ellis, the focus of the movie, Pride, doesn’t encounter those kinds of problems any more.

I remember taking ballet as a girl. I heard about the Dance Theater of Harlem, where black children learned to become beautiful ballerinas–together. I used to dream of growing up and dancing with them.

I could see Pride doing the same thing for swimmers. Jim Ellis has been running his swim program for 35 years. His swimmers have gone on to place in the Pan Pacific Games, and qualify for the Olympics.

But he started out just trying to give some boys some discipline and structure. And though the racial composition of his club has changed over the years, it is still a place where black folks can swim and not be the only brown face they see. That’s important, because you shouldn’t feel like a freak because you can swim.