All The Other Me's

I have internet now! Woo! Here's something I wrote during my un-internet week of doom:

Occasionally, I get glimpses of myself living different lives. Lives that were brought up by different parents, with different friends, different morals and ideals, and different experiences and cultures. I’ll see these lives in front of me, either in the form of an actual person who had the necessary experiences to equate one of the different lives, or in the form of a group that is missing one member – the other me. As I meandered along on my destination-free walk the other night, I found myself trailing behind a father in the act of teaching his son how to ride a bicycle. At first, they were going far slower than I would have liked and I had to purposefully keep my pace calm if I wanted to venture unnoticed with them for a while. The bike occasionally swerved straight towards a parked car or a pesky wall and, even though my heart did a little jump every time a crash was eminent, the dad was quick enough to prevent any major disasters. This was a good thing because I didn’t want my little 10-minute stalking spree to end in tears and scraped up knees. Each time the handlebars made a crazy pivot towards doom and the father methodically straightened things out just in time, I couldn’t help but smile from behind them and wish that I could somehow partake in, instead of just witness, this simple parent-child moment. The father started trotting ahead, making the son go faster to keep up. That’s when it happened. That’s when I glimpsed a different me there, running ahead on the other side of the bike, cheering for the kid as he caught up with us and then laughing with the father as he started pedaling ahead, picking up speed and confidence. My own pace quickened as I realized that the father, son and other me were now sprinting, racing eachother down the sidewalk, pedaling and striding with friendly competition, leaving the real me decidedly behind. I could no longer follow without looking loony for trying to keep up with two strangers. They reached a corner and turned right and a few beats later, I was crossing the intersection, accepting defeat and going straight. As casually as possible, I glanced down the street and saw that the boy was now several meters beyond the father, slowing as he reached another intersection and looking back over his shoulder to make sure his dad was still there, huffing and puffing and laughing. Two minutes later, as I tripped and stumbled and tried to avoid a rather wild and persistent three-year old on a tricycle, nearly failing at saving my shins, I noticed that the other me was nowhere in sight.