In third grade, I walk to school every day with a girl who is a year older than me. We walk on a dirt road with houses on one side and a field on the other.

The daily walk starts quietly, with our two voices blending with the ancient voices of the little birds in the field. Drops of dew cling to blades of grass like paper bag lunches. Other kids join us on the way until an entire group of us arrives in the schoolyard.

It is like this at first, anyway, before the new subdivision begins to be built. Instead of walking next to a field, we walk through a construction site. Our voices and the birds’ voices cannot compete with the loud machines.

One morning, a section of our dirt road has disappeared and been replaced by a large hole. The excavator is still working on it, it’s long, graceful arm reaching into the hole and scooping dirt out with sharp claws as it whirs loudly.

I want to take a wide detour around the hole. My friend wants to walk to the edge of hole so the guy in the excavator can see us, and then walk carefully around the edge.

We start walking slowly towards the excavator, but I panic and run around the scary obstacle. My friend runs after me.

“Why did you do that?” she asks once we’re on the other side.

As an adult, I recount these events to my parents, but neither of them remembers me having to walk through a construction site.

“I believe you, I just don’t remember that,” my dad tells me.

Did they just not know about the construction? Is that why they still let me walk to school?