SHORT #7: A Bicycle in the Stars

and the process of regaining the twinkle in our eyes

At dusk a young girl rides her bike downhill along a narrow street lined with small shops and paper lanterns. She pedals, then coasts, moving lightly and swiftly, gliding across the earth. Gravity and the wind are her friends, and in her eyes, the universe reflects itself.

We say such a person has a twinkle in their eye. Twinkle, like a star. Twinkle like a star in a universe full of stars. A young human being riding with gravity and the wind and the universe in her eyes knows that everything is possible.

Later though, she will become convinced that only certain things, done certain ways, with certain permission from others, are possible.

Yet, in the view of the universe, nothing has changed. The change was only in her view.

The young woman works for twelve years, for a society that promises to fill the empty void it created by killing her curiosity and wonder.

The social contract she makes, requires her to keep that curiosity and wonder locked up tightly in a dark place. As she abides by this contract, each moment, each day, each month, each year, the void in her life is magically filled. She buys the latest new clothes and gadgets, though she always feels strange to throw away the old ones; she gossips and obsesses over the latest stars, though she somehow finds it uncomfortable using the word ‘star’ to describe these ones; and she supports this life with something they call ‘honest’ work, though at times she feels somehow dishonest in doing it.

All this time, with the curiosity and wonder still locked up by decree of society, the memory of the evening when the career woman’s eyes twinkled on that bicycle, and when anything was possible, slowly becomes a fuzzy impossible blur, easily out-resolved by the clarity of the latest ultra mega folding curvy flat screen. Such is life, she thinks. The living world she had thought she was a part of, must not actually be so.

Yet, in the view of the universe, nothing has changed. The change was only in her view.

One night after work, she decides to walk home along the narrow street lined with shops and paper lanterns. Accordingly, this happens to be the night that an idea floats on the wind. The woman already expects it, hears it move through the old tree, and she listens. Minutes later she is floating down the alleys and the avenues. She feels the wind, rides with it tickling her face, moves in harmony with the earth.

Tears fill this Japanese woman’s eyes as the old shops blur past, the paper lanterns sway, the clouds clear in the night sky and again she remembers, she shifts her view. She wipes the tears from her cheeks and stares up into the miraculous universe that she is part of.

The stars twinkle above, and in her eyes. Here in this moment the twinkly eyed woman makes a promise, that whatever she does next, she will do with a love for this life.

Some months later it turns out that this love was infectious. So infectious, that the universe reflects itself now, not only in her, but in all of us.

Yet, in the view of the universe, nothing has changed. The change was only ever in our view.

Thanks for reading this week’s story! I’m Patrick, an ecological artist working to imagine more equitable, resilient, regenerative cities. Each week I illustrate and write a short like the one you just read. Though you can also find me doing various, other, creative ecology projects most days.

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