Firsts: Part II

First SUCCESS as an Ava-toting cyclist!  As I've mentioned many, many times on this blog, we live in a beautiful house outside of the main city center.  The only problems is that the main road to get to Ava's school, our neighborhood Piazza and mercatino (small outside market) and the way into downtown is very, very old...and very, very tiny...with huge, massive trucks...and fast, whirring motorini everywhere!  I knew when we were coming back to Italy this time, that I HAD to find an alternative to walking everywhere, or relying on a cheuffer.  So we've been taking the bus, and still walking, but yesterday I finally got up the guts to ride a bike!

Now, let me just say, I'm really terrified of bikes.  I am petrified of the possibility of falling right over if a gust of wind blew me just right, or I hit a pothole at the perfect angle, or just plain run into a parked car!  Well, last week we took F.'s ancient bikes to get all fixed up and cleaned and they attached a child's seat onto the back of one.  I figured it would be one of those big plastic things that sits on the back, with like 4 seatbelts and slots for little legs to be protected.  Kinda like this:

Even if I happened to fall over, or there was a little accident, at least Ava's body would be mostly protected from hitting the road.  That would have given me more confidence as a mom, being the one responsible for her safety and well-being!  It would have blostered my confidence that I could ride this bike with Ava strapped in, helmet on head, and we'd be all over the city after 2 minutes of practice!  Hmmm..I should have known the Italian's wouldn't be so preoccupied with safety the way my American brain has been programmed since birth.  So this is what my little girl is dealing with by way of protection from all the massive trucks, speeding cars, and noisy motorini:

Now don't get me wrong.  I see tons of these little seats on the backs of bicycles that are parked all over the city!  And I'm thankful that this is a good alternative to taking 20 minutes to walk to school with Ava, since a bike ride would cut it down to maybe 5 minutes tops.  There are just 2 problems:  A, I never see people riding their bikes with actual kids IN the seats and B, I haven't been riding a bike since I was probably 12 so I don't have much experience, let alone the nerve to venture onto these dangerous roads with my precious child barely protected!

But it's just something I gotta do.  And so I did.  Yesterday it wasn't too windy, and the sun was out and happy and bright.  So F. announced it was the day for my bicycle lesson.  I just had to do it, and thankfully he'd be there if any cars came out to bite me.  So while Ava was at school, he and I rode to our mercatino...down that ominous road...thankfully after the main morning traffic had died down.  No problem!  I was doing it, white knuckles and all, but I was doing it!  We stopped in the market to make our usual "rounds" and then decided to pick up Ava on our way back home.  He would ride the bike with the child seat, and I'd take the bike without any gears.  No problem.  Except when he literally asked me "Come va?" how's it going? and I reply "Bene!!"  Good!  And then the chain came off...perfect timing.  Apparently I broke the bike somehow, but I tried not to panic as F. was riding along happily and couldn't hear me screaming behind him "Wait!  Something happened!  It broke!"  

At least we were close to Ava's school, so I walked the bike to where I knew he'd be waiting and tried to explain what happened.  He attempted to reattach that greasy chain while I brought out Ava.  I had to play it up big when I saw her, saying "Hey!  You wanna ride with F. on the big bike back home??  You don't have to walk!!  It'll be like you're flying!!" and she totally bought it, she got really excited.  So she did it!  I strapped a little old helmut on her head, buckled the one little belt around her waist, and told her to hold on to Frankie!  I think the first minute her face must have resembled something like mine did when I first started riding a bike again.  I walked the broken bike half-way home and then we switched in an area that was more quiet and uncongested.  I could tell Ava was more apprehensive when I took over with her on the back. She said "Ok mommy...be very careful!" and I replied with my motherly-yet-somewhat-forced-nonchalance "Ah, don't worry babe...I got ya...I won't let anything happen.  We can do it if we're together!" And we did it, no problem.