We all get places in different ways. Jennifer Sun uses a bicycle.
Her bike took her into the outside world in a way unique to her. It gave her an appreciation of nature she had not previously experienced through things like camping or road trips. And it took her to where she wanted to go.
In the fifth grade Sun would ride her bike to her local park to pick up trash, a sight she hated to see. That feeling towards destruction of nature continues today. “ I hate to see garbage in a park or on the grass it just really bugs me,” said Sun, pointing to a piece of trash on the grass near the bench. She still frequents her local park near her home in Dallas, Texas. Still stopping to pick up trash she sees.
After the 5th grade, she stopped biking for the most part until summer of last year. “I was just feeling really fat,” she said. So one day she simply got on her bike and rode, it was the beginning of a steady habit. Now when she is bored she climbs on her bike to find something to do. Even her friends now also ride their bikes places with her instead of driving. Even when it is out hot she just puts on a hat and goes for it.
Sun’s bike is her bridge to all sorts of other things friends, things to do places she goes to. For her it’s an escape from boredom “it does for me what walking can’t” she said. If she does walk she does it to get somewhere, whereas when she rides her bike it takes her places. “I try not to think of it as a cliché. I don’t do it for a release or to make myself feel better I just do it to do something.”
Sun is more in touch with nature in her park than any other place she goes, “you might be on a road trip and your dad will point to a mountain and say isn’t that beautiful and you try to appreciate it but it just feels forced,” she said. Her park on the other hand is something that no matter how many times she takes her bike through the park, it makes nature more relevant and important.
The things she enjoys, from her friends to reading are all made accessible by her bike. The library for quiet reading, the mall for hanging out with her friends and just taking a ride around to see what’s going on her bike takes her to al the places she wants to go. So even though biking is just one facet of Sun’s life, it is a road to many others.
- Alexander Escobedo
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