ANTIQUES BICYCLE

my new ride, an ancient Peugot. She's got flava for days, Edith.
ma vie en gold.
I spent the evening tonight at the Sacramento Bike Kitchen. It's a funky non-profit joint, for the neighborhood, by the neighborhood, and oh yeah, there's an awesome gallery attached, too. And artist studio spaces, and a big open yard filled with art and people from age six to about sixty, I'm guesstimating. Everyone is working together, the whole point is to learn how to make your bike be the best thing it can be. This has got to be in the top five ways to spend a summer evening.

The Kitchen, as it's known, is owned by a guy called Dave Dave, a really cool fella who wants kids to have bikes, and for his community to have a place to hang out. He started SBK two years ago, and there's surprising little information about him around the shop, or even on their website. I guess he'd rather focus on the bikes and the kids, than on his own glory. He was super nice and welcomed me warmly, not at all concerned that I had no idea what I was doing there. I went with my nervous palms and an open mind, and learned a lot. I also got dirty, made some friends and got a great bike.

The Kitchen looks like a regular used parts bike shop at first glance. Then you look closer and if you hang out a while, you learn that all the people working here are volunteers, all of the parts you see being used/for sale in the shop have been donated, and the lines between helper and helpee are virtually nonexistent. There's always someone to hold a wrench, or help you look at that wheel to tell you if it's really true, or grab the lube from the top shelf for you.

It's definitely a real bicycle store. Everything is actually for sale, for cheap. No kid pays for a bike. My super-sweet old Peugot cost me $40, road-ready (ish), plus $8 for front and rear lights, and a water bottle cage. All the labor was free, because we did it. My friend Sandy, who hangs out volunteering at the Kitchen every Thursday (*she's one half of my host family and a gateway to all kinds of stuff in Sacramento, I have a mostly-written post about the glass studio she works at, too)- she trued up my wheels and is going to help me with some other small repairs. While she worked on the wheels, I cleaned up the rest of Edith (so named because she's French, and I love Edith Piaf. The bike's ma vie en gold.) and shined up the chrome. SBK has all the stuff you'd ever need for working on your bike, all free to anyone.

The vibe is sweet, the Kitchen is clearly the 'Third Place' for this neighborhood, a diverse area of Sacramento. There were white kids, black kids, Asian kids and some brown kids in muslim garb. A 16-ish year old sweet-faced kid in a beaded yarmulke helped me choose my bike. Everyone's got ideas, everyone can have a popsicle, everyone's input is equal here.

The younger kids head home as close to dark as possible without invoking the ire of a cautious mama at home. My little friend whom I helped inflate his tire earlier in the evening, gave me dap on his way out. I was cool for a minute.

Tonight felt like a great episode in a really cool TV series. I can't wait for the next ones, where I ride my bike to SBK and watch an outdoor movie on the sheet they hang from the side of the building on a hot night, or the episode where I go to their attached gallery on Second Saturday, and meet those freaky artists who made those crazy art bikes. Stay tuned for more-I love this series, my life.

Amani Loutfy is an editorial blogger at JustCauseIt.com/blogs/amaniellen.

The bike racks at Maroubra Beach - shot over 30 seconds with 14 bursts of flash with a cheap kids pink plastic bucket over a 580exii flash head held at various points thru the left & right of the shot.