Candy-store. I've made the interesting discovery that there is at least one type of object memory that is every bit as evocative as any smell-memory that I've had. Heretofore I've been convinced that only those memories evoked by olfactory stimuli could have that gladdening, tormenting, or heartbreaking sock-in-the-gut effect.

A machine-memory, in this case. A bike. The spouse wanted a commuting bike, the keed needed a bike to get to school. I thought I'd be practical and hold off for a few months. It had been, after all, almost two decades since I've owned a bicycle.

But of course I ended up getting one too. Why? Because the best bike I ever rode as a kid, a Raleigh, of the type they used to call an "English racer", associated with memories of endless summer and expansive childhood freedom, had been reincarnated and shipped to the local bike store. They brought out a few commuting bikes for the spouse to test, a couple of them Raleigh brand, and I decided to lower the seat on two and toodle around the lot while I waited, just to pass the time. One was a Schwinn that left me cold. But that Raleigh was teasingly like that old bike, that Ur bike, that perfect bike of childhood. I asked to see a woman's model of the same with a narrower, touring tire. And it was astonishing how the feel of that old bike came back; it had the feel exactly. Not that it's odd that a manufacturer should maintain certain characteristics across the decades. But for the first time I viscerally understood what people mean when they say this or that "made them feel young again". It's amazing the memory circuits some contraption of rubber and aluminum can kick into action. I wanted to laugh out loud, and especially to find some place where I could try to ride with no hands. (The old English racer was the last word in high-performance hands-free riding.)

I can't say I succeeded in the look-ma no hands. The handlebar design and hence balance is different, and I am older, slower, and aware that it will take much longer to recover from a spill than it took when I last rode this bike. (Yes, I'm sure it really is the same bike, if different in appearance, back from the dead.) Amid the happy memories were other warning memories that had preserved in hiding that special feel of having gravel ground into one's knees, shins, and insteps, for example. But I did go out and ride longer than I probably should have, considering that I am two decades out of bike-shape. Too much sun, more than anything. But I'm excited as a little kid with a new bike, poring over the Iowa bike trail map.

Posted by Moira Breen at August 04, 2003 02:44 PM