Arrival of the Bike Party

Arrival of the Bike Party.  Noor appeared late on Thursday evening, during the Fiesta--we were in the middle of a song--and she waited to tell me, "Come to Memorial Park tomorrow night at 8:30... Near where you live." Smiling, looking up at me in anticipation, her hair now a halo of red-orange-gold. "This is my personal invitation..."

So, in the Friday darkness, not quite sure, I made my way down quiet streets to the empty park--just a mother or two gathered in the play area, a few small children, and a foursome chatting quietly on the grass. No sign of Noor....

But then the first swoop of bikes arrived--ten or twelve boys, in their teens, adamant energy, pulling in to an instant stop. Followed in a minute or two by more--the riders still mainly young, but now with enough grown-up faces to make me wonder. And then, down Washingon Street, more and more, numbering in the dozens, hundreds, likewise all gliding in onto the grass. The Bike Party has arrived. Tiny lights attached to the the wheels, clipped to tee shirts and vests, dotting people's hair, strips, solid, flashing, all the insistent colors of LED's... And then, again from way up Washington Street, a full moon overhead, the sound of music--travelling towards us--an African disco dance beat, amplified, and even more lights, now stacked up high on some larger conveyance--which as it drew nearer became a float of color, music throbbing, lights flashing, everyone smiling, and there right alongside, on her bike, Noor's face, very happy...

She asked me to dance, and we did--amidst a crowd of kids--the girl with the impossibly blond hair and mis-matched fishnets, the young Victor Mature with his white tuxedo coat covered in flashing dots-- he hands me a key holder--to press the edge and all the lights change color. Another, young, a guy, his shirt mainly off, way up in the limbs of the oak tree, a pagan faun dancing wildly amidst the branches...

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An evening 60 years before--where this magic began. A warm night, in La Jolla--we were riding (with the Price kids, their family living somewhere nearby for the summer)--all by ourselves, on the path along the edge of the cliffs above the ocean--Bird Rock, Wind-an-Sea, moonlight, that same sense of adventure, euphoria--everything open...

For the first time... a world of our own...



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(Painting and writing from March 15, 2014. For Noor.)