Many times I have driven by a motorist stranded alongside the highway. Sometimes the driver is wandering curiously around the vehicle as though searching for an overt obstruction; other times, he is lying beneath the vehicle apparently intent upon remedying a flat tire or a mechanical defect. Whatever the eventuality (and aside from the predominantly forlorn nature of the sight, it is often impossible at high speed to discern the precise dilemma), I have always whistled mournfully upon seeing someone in despair. Never however have I authentically imagined that my turn is next.
Today – with stunning pronouncement – I had a flat tire while riding my Ecolo Cycle Pronto. The flagrant irony of the event is not that it happened (I accept the gamble); rather that it happened within minutes of having been asked by WRT to join him and his bride Gail on the patio for a mid-afternoon confab. After our discourse and as soon as I had careered the trike off the property, I heard the tell-tale flapping of one of the rear tires. Sure enough, upon stopping to give the tire a squeeze, it was flat. I shamelessly continued to ride the trike home (this time employing the electric button). I had already shared with my erstwhile hosts that getting to the bathroom is a challenge for me. Indeed I am confident they were surprised to discover the extent of my immobility given my appearance of Olympic athleticism on the trike (though pointedly while seated).
The point of this trifling chronicle – not to lapse too swiftly into the vernacular – is that “stuff happens”. Nobody is spared the sometimes inexpressible violation of things. Though I haven’t a particularly broad repertoire of hardship, I have naturally learned that overcoming the unsettling moments of life is both axiomatic and preferred. Preferred for obvious reasons; axiomatic because the alternative is downhill or out of the picture. Nonetheless not everyone readily embraces the opportunity to deal with setbacks.
Although a flat tire on a tricycle is philosophically mundane, it is yet illustrative of the remedial mechanics associated with disappointment. The first issuance of the problem is the decision to acknowledge the difficulty – and, as quickly, to begin to resolve it. This calculated process may however require time. Accordingly the next step in addressing disenchantment is to formulate a new or modified version of the initial performance.
Once we position ourselves directly aside the problem, we are upon a new threshold which – while facilitating the correction of an existing problem – further enables us to consider what alternatively might be done until the task is complete. Directing one’s attention elsewhere is not abandonment but adoption; that is, putting one matter on a new plateau while engaging another. Merely visualizing the engagement of each is sufficient to expedite the complexity of both.
It is typical of my modus operandi that I rely generously upon the advantage of agency when it comes to action. It is in my opinion an accommodation of doubtful value to persist in the perfection of a matter either through one’s own skills or the qualified skills of another. The withdrawal from my own initiative is the consequence not of indolence but of my primary (and often exclusive) dedication to thoroughness and completeness. It is I suspect the product of the ritual practice of law wherein one routinely works with others (realtors, inspectors, surveyors, title searchers, government bodies and municipal employees) to achieve the contractual goal.
Increasingly too I am adopting the view that if one pathway is obstructed, there are others which are not. I activate the same spirit identified with a game of pinball, a response to the mixture of chance and design.
In the throes of this reputed puddle, I am bound to inform you that there were many exceptional images of highly desirable regard. It was immediately clear that, within the relatively confined boundaries of life, there are magnificent and often unanticipated rewards. It makes one anxious to grasp whatever opportunity is at hand.