Community Cheers For Girl Learning To Ride Her Bike

DANA POINT, CA — Dana Point area mother Gracie Gonzalez was suffering for her little girl who was trying and failing to learn how to ride her new bike. Like many children across the southland, that bright and shiny new bike was left for Tawny under the family Christmas tree.

Steep slopes in their neighborhood made bike riding scary for the 4-year-old Tawny. With the gorgeous post-Christmas weather, Gonzalez took her daughter out to the Capo Beach and Campground parking area to give the shiny new pink bike and helmet a whirl.

It would be the perfect spot for the young girl to get used to being on wheels.

According to Gonzalez, young Tawny was petrified to ride the new bike, even with the training wheels.

That is when bystanders stepped in to show their support.

"I was trying to encourage her to try, and total strangers came up to tell them how great she was doing," Gonzales wrote on the Capo Cares community Facebook group.

As her daughter gained confidence and began to pedal on her own, more bystanders got involved.

"(They) erupted in applause and encouragement," she wrote. "She actually rode on her own after that."

It would be easy to watch a mother trying to teach her child to ride a bike from afar, to not get involved, or even to video the event and share it with your social media feeds. For Gracie Gonzalez, having the people in that area step in with encouraging words, smiles, and cheers was a testament to doing good. People helping people, strangers lifting up strangers.

Gonzalez wanted to thank her community with a picture of her daughter giving those wheels a go, adding a message of thanks for people she did not know.

Though Tawny remains a bit apprehensive about riding her bike, her mother says she gets bolder every day, and rides with her stuffed animal friends perched on a seat between the handlebars.

"It was a beautiful moment to end the year with," Gonzalez said. "Thank you."

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