Vignette - they take to the road

The scene: the cul-de-sac in front of our house. Now that the snow's pretty much melted, the kids have been clamoring to get back on their bikes. So after hauling their dusty wheels out of the dusty garage and pumping up the tires, I've set them loose on an unsuspecting neighborhood.

Either the bikes got smaller or they grew over the winter, because their legs seem a little more bunched up than I remember from last year. It means we'll soon have to initiate a new round of bike-themed hand-me-downing, but for today, they seem content to take their smallish machines for a spin.

Their excited voices echo off the silent houses as they cruise longish circles up and down the empty street. The pavement is chaotically streaked with salt stains, crusty mud and patches of gravel and grit, signs of a hard winter that they know could come back any day and turn it all back into pure white.

But for now, they're happy to have been sprung from the house, happy to taste a little bit of the outdoors as spring tantalizingly beckons. This is, I suppose, what freedom looks like when you've been watching the world through a frosty living room window for four months.

Before long, the late afternoon shadows push the sun away and paint the street with increasingly blue-tinged light. They shiver in their sweaters and blow warm air onto their hands before deciding they've had enough for now. They make their way inside and pat the puppy who's been watching them patiently from the front door.

Tomorrow's another day, another opportunity to continue to expand their view of the world. I won't always be so lucky to stand beside the road and watch them as I have today.