Bike Ride

I’m sure we’ve all wondered, at one time or another, what the hell happened to us in our early life to make us who we are today. Nailing down what those childhood events are is always an interesting thing. Granted, it’s not necessarily a topic that comes up in daily conversation, at least not outside of private therapy sessions. But what I’ve come to realize, despite the risk of sounding like a thoroughly annoying human being that you wish would stop talking, is that self-awareness is a pretty beautiful thing. Throughout my young adult life, I’ve become more and more (sometime painfully so) attuned to my personal experiences that may have caused me to be the lovable, petite pile of dysfunction we’ve all come to know and love (in more ways than one, wink wink - I’m talking to you, gents. And, one lucky, drunk-off-her-ass Polish blonde babe.) So, what’s at the root for most people? Well, there’s the “blame mom” standard. Then of course the countless girls with daddy issues, and the boys with Napoleon complexes. But what about me? I didn’t really ever deal with any of those things. Yeah, sure, I didn’t always get along with my momz, and my awkward junior high years were brutal and filled with rejection. But I wasn’t starved for daddy’s love, no one ever touched my “nono” place, and for the most part, my childhood was happy. So why then, dear god, did I turn into a girl who was incredibly sex-crazy and a huge magnet for awkward and very weird life experiences?

I had not a clue, at first. Honestly, I don’t spend most of my downtime pondering this question. I’ve come to just accept it, and through writing and story time telling, to thoroughly enjoy it. Which I suppose is a healthy place to be, but then I remembered one particular story from my young childhood years that could maybe, just maybe, hold the key to why I became the insanely flaky man-lover I would one day become. I mean, let’s be real: my barbies weren’t going shopping, they made out and, ya know, played with each other. So, while even the most brilliant of Freudians may remain stumped, I figure this story is the only thing that could possibly explain why, oh why, I am who I am.

Like most 6-7 year olds, I spent a lot of time during that period of my life conquering a specific rite of passage: learning to ride a bicycle. Finally came the day when I was able to make my first solo ride, without the assistance of my parents holding on or training wheels. I was seven years old, and I OWNED that sidewalk. At least, for about five minutes. It was pure exhilaration, and, unable to contain my excitement, I began pedaling with more and more vigor and reckless abandon down my street. I started to lose control of my two-wheeler, but it was strange. I didn’t crash into anything, I just lost my balance and kinda veered into a neighbors lawn. The bike tipped over, with me still on it. While lying sideways on the ground, still on the bike seat, I felt a sharp pain in my crotch as I wriggled myself out from under my bike. That particular pain went to the back burner as the bigger distraction quickly became the sharper pain stemming from the cut I now had on my thumb. I wheeled myself back home, injured and momentarily defeated. I spent the next ten minutes whining about and repeatedly looking at this bleeding thumb wound, and understandably my sister lost patience and definitely wanted to injure me much more than that. She told me to shut up already, that my thumb was FINE. Miffed and insulted, I ran away to go play out front. But, I was overcome with a sudden sensation that I had to pee. I went inside to the upstairs bathroom, and as I was peeing, I glanced down (as you do.) I furrowed my brow at the crotch of my underwear because I saw there was blood in them. I stared for a couple of seconds, totally bewildered by this. Being only in the second grade, I was unlearned in the ways of the female body. So naturally, I called for - whom else? - my FATHER. The exchange went a little something like this:

Me: Dad?
Dad: (one floor down) What?
Me: Can you come here?
Dad: (sighing, probably assuming I saw a bug or something and needed him to kill it, because that’s the only thing we really called him for in this house) Why?
Me: (starting to panic) Can you just come here, quick, please?
Dad: What is it?
Me: THERE’S BLOOD IN MY UNDERWEAR.
Dad: (silence) (more silence)
Me: …Dad?


(I may have been ignorant then to the mysterious ovaries, but my dad wasn’t, and now that I’m not either I can be entertained by the thoughts that must have been running through his head. P.S., he definitely has chosen to not remember this. Blood? What blood? I have a daughter? And so on.) I didn’t know what to do following my father’s deafening silence. So, I sat on the toilet and… did nothing. I mean, what does a girl do when she's 7 and has blood in her undies? I remained chillin’ on the throne, waiting, for something, anything. I don’t know what exactly. But next thing I knew, my mom and grandma were marching up the stairs to see what the hell my father couldn’t handle. Their looming figures stood in the bathroom doorway and I looked up at them, innocent and unsuspecting as anything. Help had arrived! I mean, it’s my mom and my grandma. No reason not to trust those two ladies. Without hesitation, I showed them the blood in my panties and explained about the bike accident. My grandma concluded, “Ohhhh, she must be cut down there.” Before I knew what was happening, or had a chance to argue, my underwear was taken away and I was being hoisted onto my brother’s bed, on my back and with my legs up in the air. As if a cool breeze hitting my vagina wasn’t bad enough, my mom and grandma went on instant pussy patrol, looking around and trying to see where the blood was coming from.

Mom: I can’t see anything, can you?
Grandma: Hold on, I’m going to get a flashlight.

I laid there, unaware of how ridiculous THAT statement was, of how crazy this whole situation was. It became exponentially worse when I had to wait, lying like that. Legs up in the air and all, for what felt like hours. Grandma finally came back from her mission, having successfully located a flashlight, which she held up like the olympic torch in the final leg as she re-entered the room. Then the two of them proceeded to peer and dig around my now-illuminated nether regions. All I heard was the two of them saying,

Mom: Is that it?
Grandma: No, no, that’s just a freckle.
Mom: What about that?
Grandma: What?
Mom: There, I think that’s it- over there, see it?
Grandma: I don’t know, move over.

HOW MUCH TERRAIN COULD THERE POSSIBLY BE? I could semi-see their two heads, side by side, squinting and eyeballing away. I guess they must have found it, since Grandma shouted, “A-HA!” And, since Mom left to get some first aid supplies and the two of them applied it. They cleaned it up and I bounced off the bed, good as new.

And so began the path I would travel. I think about this story, and sure, it’s not SOOO crazy. But it did start a trend that would continue to repeat throughout my life: normal things that would never go normally for me. And though I don’t think I consciously became who I was because of this bike ride, it definitely marked the start of the, “Elena, this only happens to you” pattern. Take a normal event, like a bike ride. Sure, for most young kids on their first cruise, it would end up a bike ride gone wrong, with a fall or a crash — and that’s it. But for me, it wasn’t simply because I fell or crashed like most 7 year olds, nor did it end there. No, I somehow managed to maim the one part of me that you would think would be protected, it being on a seat and covered by several layers and all. The single most private part of my body? Of COURSE that would be what gets cut. Of COURSE it would have to be medicinally aided by two older women manned with flashlights and Neosporin (but not before somehow getting my dad involved in the mix, and you can bet he erased this or just permanently blocked it from his memory.)

And so would be my life. Experiences that should go smoothly and normally, but never would. From doctor’s appointments to hook-ups to train rides to boyfriends to sex, I know now, after an early-life event like that, the trend could never have ever been any different.