Can I Go Outside?

Spring can't get here fast enough. I hate being trapped in the house. I'm an outdoorsy person. Actually, I'm just a damn fool. I walk everywhere and, for some reason, feel cabin fever at the thought of staying in the house for even one day. When it was warm, the baby and I were all over town. I actually need a new stroller because the tire treads are worn down to the plastic rims.

My fascination with outside started at a young age. You see, I grew up under Soviet rule. My mother had me at fifteen so during the day she went to school. In the afternoons she went to her Federal Government "Stay in School" job and in the evenings and nights she worked a part-time job. That left me to stay with my grandparents, architects of the iron curtain.

My grandmother worked at night, so from the time I got out of school until five o'clock, I tried my best to cram in as much "outside time" as possible. It wasn't easy though because they treated our neighborhood like Berlin. First off, I was not allowed to go outside the gate. My grandmother lived on the outskirts of Capitol Hill. That meant that it was nice enough where people weren't getting shot left and right, but it was close enough to the hood where those people walked by on occasion. She also believed that every other child in the world was up to no good and thus I had to stay inside the fence.

I don't know if you've seen the average row house in DC, but the yard is usually 5 square feet at best. My fun games included:

• See how many steps you can jump down without hurting yourself


• See how many steps you can jump up without hurting yourself


• Throw the ball to the top of the stairs and watch it roll down


• Throw the ball up in the air as high as you can and then catch it


• Throw the ball up in the air as high as you can, spin around and catch it


• Try not to cry as the other neighborhood kids laugh at you because you can't come out the gate.

Good times.

As I got older, my privileges expanded. Around seven years old, I was allowed to go as far as the tree. Sadly this was only about four houses down or twenty feet. Still, it gave me plenty of room to fly my kite. I'd run full speed for the whole twenty feet and then turn around and run back. I was fat as a kid so this game didn't last long. Eventually I convinced them to let me go to the other alley. That meant that I could now ride my bike. What fun I had riding forty feet or eight houses and then turning around and riding back.

This, of course, only lasted until five o'clock. That's when my grandmother went to her night job and my grandfather's dictatorship took over. I couldn't go outside at all once my grandmother left. I was able to sit in the window and on really really nice days, he'd let me sit on the step. I couldn't go down the stairs, but I could sit at the top steps. Whenever he wasn't looking, my defiant side would kick in and I'd sit on the second or third step from the top (just to show him who was boss).

Considering all of this, it is no wonder that when I turned about twelve (and they started letting me actually cross the street) that I took off for hours at a time. I'd tell them that I was going to the playground around the corner, but I'd be downtown at the monument or one of the museums. To this day, the Smithsonian remains one of my favorite places to go. The exhibits aren't that interesting, but everytime I cross the door I remember how free I used to feel.