Low Tide

A very low point

 

Low Tide

 

Being a poor child in a town full of middle class people described me growing up. We never had much, never anything extra. Inwardly I was quite envious of all those around me. They had the nice clothes, nice houses, nice furniture, nice cars, nice yards, nice everything. Seeing this day in and day out could turn a person very bitter. I worked for everything I had then, I work for everything I have now. 

            Well, I had a friend who had it all. Super nice everything. Always got the nice clothes, the nicest clothes and talk about a house! His room and bathroom would make up half my house. 

            When we were getting into the awkward ages, he didn’t. He did have one thing that I had to help him with. His bike was plain and he wanted it to be cool. I built cool bikes, always the coolest in town and I helped him build the nicest bike possible. The color was hand picked, carefully painted and the chrome re-polished to shine brighter than new. We were in our early teens, maybe thirteen or fourteen at this time. 

            Crime was a problem. Bikes got stolen from time to time. My favorite bike was stolen twice, but recovered within a day or so. We always locked our bikes after mine disappeared, usually together. 

            One night I rode by his house and I knew they were out for the evening, or maybe it was the weekend. His bike was outside and unlocked. We had a falling out over something, I don’t remember what at this time, so I did not take care of his bike the way I normally did. If I saw his bike out and unlocked, I would place it in the basement of his house or the utility room and lock it up for him. Since we had this falling out, I didn’t do anything about the bike that night, or the next. It stayed outside in the rain for two days, then the third night it was stolen.

            I could have taken care of this for him, and I could have gone to the police that day when I saw the bike was gone. Maybe I never forgave myself for letting that bike get stolen, but it still causes me some pain when I think about what I could have prevented. Not just his bike being stolen. I could have removed the temptation to steal it from the person who stole it, and ended up getting caught later. His only offense and he spent a year in juvenile detention for it. Two people, maybe more suffered because of some stupid argument, and I don’t think our friendship ever recovered after this either.

Reviews

[Ufi Auttorri ~ Amy C. T..]

Hey George... This could be just a story or it could be true (personal or otherwise). I don't think that matters too much. The moral of the story is what's important and you told it well. These choices we make always seem to be so glaringly simple in retrospect, don't they? Some say that we're here to "learn" and that some things, some life events are going to stick with us because they're supposed to. A good story, well written. Thanks for sharing.