Music In The Summer Air

I took a little walk tonight, just to get out of the house and stretch some. While strolling along the main street near my home I heard a very familiar sound; the soft rhythmic slap, slap, slap of  baseball cards hitting the spokes of a bicycle. I turned around and, sure enough, there was a boy about ten years old on his bike, sturdy legs pumping the pedals, the cardboard cards hitting the spokes and making music in the summer air.

I was immediately transported to the summer of 1967 and I was the boy on his bike, riding hell bent for leather up and down Baker Street, followed closely by my friends. All of us had baseball cards on our bikes, all of us imagining we were on great loud motorcycles terrorizing the streets of Providence. The older folks sat out on their porches watching over us, perhaps dreaming of their own youth, their own gangs of kids, their own baseball cards slap, slap, slapping on the silver spokes, making music in the summer air.