The Mast-Head

Lately I have been taking my elder daughter, Adelia, to the East Hampton Town Youth Park on Abraham's Path to ride her little purple bicycle with training wheels. Adelia fell in love with the bike in the spring when she saw it in a Sag Harbor bicycle shop.

To my wife's and my amazement, she hopped right on and was able to pedal around on the carpet, despite having made only occasional and desultory use of her tricycle. We thought she was a genius or something until a salesman told us that most kids find two-wheelers easier to operate because their body weight is above the pedals. It was all we could do to coax Adelia out of the shop without it.

The bike reappeared a few weeks later as a birthday present from her Grandma Helen. The route of her first ride took her down the office driveway and all the way to the 1770 House on the sidewalk with only one spill.

A few days later, I thought of taking her to the park, where she could ride without having to worry about cars, sidewalk cracks, or pedestrians.

There is nothing like going to a youth park to make you feel like a part of a community. There is little interaction among the parents; reticent East Coasters, we tend to keep to ourselves and smile hello guardedly. But there is a sense of shared pleasure in the air.

After her first visit, during which her parents trailed behind as she went around the blue oval track, Adelia was confident enough to make the loop on her own. I can just make out her bike on the far side of the roller-hockey rink as she bobs along.

Usually, she stops at the south end of the park to watch the boys and teenagers on skateboards. At the other end, she often pauses to watch tennis games. "When I am a bit older, I want to play tennis," she told me when we were there on Monday night.

Taking a break from bicycling, Adelia and I played with a basketball for a while. At the other end of the court was a Latino man doing the same with his daughters.

"Que dices?" "What do you say?" he asked one daughter when I returned an errant ball. "Gracias," she replied.

Perhaps the best testament to the park is that Adelia does not want to go home. To me, her sense of accomplishment is palpable as she takes yet another loop around the track. "Just one more, Daddy. That's the agreement," she tells me. And I give in.

But then it is really time to go. Adelia's mother wants to take a run before nightfall, and it is getting darker earlier every day. The sun sets a little after 7 now, which means that the park, which shuts at dusk, will be closing earlier and earlier.

As part of the negotiation to get Adelia into my truck, I told her that we would return to the park the next evening after my work was done. There will be no ducking this promise.

David E. Rattray