The Child
A Call for Action
The child is alive and awake, present to everything the world has to offer, receptive to the affection of the parent. Arms open for whoever wants to hold him.
The child feels and perceives the stranger. Loves to be held by some, while it is fuzzy with others. No adult told the child yet, go and hug whom you do not want.
The child marvels at the unfolding world around and gets distracted with a flower, tries an onion like an apple, finds it disgusting, and goes back to the apple.
Drinks the orange from the juice, buries the watermelon in the mouth, shares the snacks with the dog, gives away the hiding spot where the cat goes.
Then the child discovers the world again while in two wheels. The world opens up, unfolding like a flower. The nectar is the air, the hills caressing the legs, the road holding the child straight.
It was a couple of months ago when infatuated with French singers and the pictures Francine Fallara posted about the Montreal Botanical Garden I decided to consult with her on the idea of riding my bicycle from Toronto to Montreal. Conversing with her, she invited me to join her team at the Great Cycling Challenge to fund research for the cure of childhood cancer. Then COVID-19 happened, and it looks like at this point, I won’t be able to leave my place of residence, the state of New Mexico, let alone travel outside the United States.
Fortunately, I don’t have a personal reason to join the Great Cycling Challenge (GCC). I don’t personally know anyone who has suffered from it. However, I know that for a parent, even a seemingly mild issue can be frightening, how much even so having a child diagnosed with cancer.
However, when I set up the profile for the GCC, a somehow selfish thought came to my mind, it was the need to save the child inside us. Please forgive me for distracting the reader from the utmost importance of alleviating children and parents from the angst I don’t even desire to imagine, must be, being diagnosed with this disease.
But then I thought about our inner children. Have we lost touch with them, buried underneath the responsibilities of paying rent, and working, seldom feeling.
Yesterday I went on a bike ride to start getting ready for the GCC, and it felt like I saw the city for the first time. Like if the wind was blowing on my face for the first time, like if I discovered speed for the first time, like if I was looking at my spinning legs for the first time.
I remember stopping at this spot by an arroyo and thinking about a friend to whom I told her, ‘you should not waste your time, in coming to this town,’ and then thinking, ‘I have to tell her to please come and listen to the water,’ which I know she could.
I looked at the city in which I lived for many years, as a child, for the first time.
We need to help save the children. No child should die.
Can we help to find a cure for childhood cancer by saving the child in us?
©Pablo Pereyra 2020. Thank you for reading.