“No matter what happens, we’ll have the most wonderful life in the world. Pleasant work and being together — Who could have it any better? When we have scraped together enough money, we can buy bicycles and take a bike tour every couple of weeks.”

– Albert Einstein, in a letter to Mileva

Somewhere, many wheres, tonight, a child will dream of a bicycle, in glistening blue, or red, or pink, perhaps with handlebar ribbons. Certainly with a bell. Mine had a bell, and a basket in front. No brakes, but I did not know that when I bought it. I would have anyway.

I was nineteen and knew it was sky blue and perhaps three times my age and cost all my savings and perfect and I loved it. I knew that with it, I could go. Anywhere I wanted. Nowhere, if I wanted. Everywhere. Around the world, on the Tour de France, to buy bread and flowers. Cliché, but mine, in brown paper. In the basket. Along the uneven bricks of Prospect Street, down a steep but short incline to the canal. On the dirt path, along the river to a grassy spot in the sun, good for bread and reading. To stop. Or not.

I knew I could go as fast or slow as I wanted. Fast. Faster than the clouds I saw sheepishly crossing the sky. They did look like little sheep; fluffy, so white they were almost pink against the brilliantly bright and blue…

I found out about the brakes.

I do not remember when or how I learned to ride a bicycle. I know I was a child. I know I must have fallen. Many times. I must have wanted to go home, blubbering and clinging to ground and trouser. I know, and am grateful, we did not.

I know we did not because since then, I have gone on many more rides and bicycles along many more roads. Some narrow – most. Some paved – rare.  Some steep – many, and very, uphill and downhill. Some I know I forgot. Some on which I know I fell. All of which, I know I loved. I know that since then, I have not clung to ground or trouser.

“The hardest part of raising a child is teaching them to ride bicycles.” To want sky enough, trust ground enough, and the hand holding the seat. To dare to kick off and pedal, and …

bicycles kept appearing, bigger, bigger, under Christmas trees until, years later, I bought one myself, with no brakes.

I was nineteen and fell off my bicycle, chasing clouds that looked like sheep. Fluffy and white, almost pink. I blubbered and climbed back on. And the clouds … still looked like sheep when I did, against the brilliant bright blue sky.

“Today, the soul is in dire need of stewardship and protection from cynicism: […] a terrible habit of mind and orientation of spirit in which […] we grow embittered about how things are and about what’s possible in the world.

Cynicism is a poverty of curiosity and imagination and ambition.”

Tonight, a jolly, globetrotting old man in a red suit and white beard – like the clouds – will ride across the sky in a sleigh. With many bells. He will go around the world – and France – squiggling down chimneys, placing blue, red, and pink bicycles under glistening trees.

“The best defense against it is vigorous, intelligent, sincere hope: […] a stretching of the soul’s ligaments, a limber reach for something greater.”

It is still too soon for the merry man to place bikes under our tree. Next year. Tonight, instead: baubles and ribbons and bells and lights. Milk, cookies. Carrots for reindeer, and tomorrow morning, two little scooters, glistening,

Light and navy blue, like the sky. Two little ones will learn to ride them, fall, climb back on, and that “no matter what happens, we’ll have the most wonderful life in the world.”