SHORT STORY: Falling off the Bike

Late one Monday afternoon, a lone man sat on a park bench.  He opened up a brown bag, stuck his hand inside and quickly closed it.  He shut his eyes and started muttering something under his breath.  At a time he should of been at work, he wasn’t.

That was the root of all his problems.

While the sky was beautifully clear, James Washington had a thick black cloud hanging ominously over his head. He had recently been laid off from his job. And now, depression had wrapped around him like a straight jacket.  James was paralyzed with an odd combination of the blues, fear and indifference.  A pigeon walked up to him, hoping there would be a scrap of something in the brown bad.  But what James was drinking, the pigeon would have refused.  The fog of his despair swirled around him, leaving him in a black mist.

About 25 yards away was a little boy with his mom.  The boy was trying to learn to ride a bike without training wheels and so far, as best as James could tell, was failing miserably.  But the kid kept after it.  He’d climb on, pedal about five feet and tumble over into the soft grass.  But instead of moping about it, the kid just got back up, dusted himself off and tried again.  Over and over the kid did this until he started to get the hang of it.  His mom would help him roll as few feet and then the kid would go a little farther.  Until finally, about an hour after James first noticed him, the kid pedaled around the park and back to his mom. (where he promptly fell over once again.)

James put his bag down and walked over to the boy and his mom.

“I’ve been watching you, young man. Good job!”

The mom smiled and said, “Thank you.”  The little boy adjusted his bike helmet and  said, “Thanks.”

Then the boy said something in a different voice to James: “I didn’t quit.  I didn’t lie there in the grass feeling sorry for myself. I got back up and dusted myself off.  I could’ve not gotten back on the bike. But I would’ve missed a lifetime of thrills.  I didn’t quit. You shouldn’t either.”

James was taken back by the kids’ comment.  He wondered, “How did he know?..”  James shook his head.  He looked back over at the bench and at the bag.

His tired eyes watered as he looked at the kid.  The little boy looked just like James did as a small child.  And that made James start to think.  Kids have no fear of failure.  They try things. They experiment. They fail and then learn from that failure. Adults? Well adults are so cautious. There are mortgages to worry about and insurance and blah, blah, blah.

And then James realized an undeniable truth: Failure isn’t falling off the bike. Failure is not getting back on.

James Washington fist bumped the little boy and said thank you again to his mother. He then walked back toward his house and prepared to get back on the bike.