The first time I taught my daughter to ride a bike, I let go too soon. She felt the release of my grasp, and panic set in. I always say that panic is not the solution to any problem. Anyway, it’s one hell of a way to ride a bike.
She weaved. The handlebars got their own control of the bike with her on it. I yelled to hit the brakes as she and her bike and her black bangs hanging loose out of her helmet careened down the street and just, like, dumped over. I felt the impact lace through my nerve endings like lightning.
She jumped up off the pavement and looked at me with her head tilted down and her eyes like slits glaring up at me. I was smiling stupidly, like, Hey! Setbacks, right?
She marched past, looking at me but also not looking at me, and said, very firmly, I will NEVER ride a bike as long as I live. Being so much like her mother, I believed her. Neither of them ever smile on stupidly at anything or anyone. They are both very funny, but they don’t mince words. That’s my thing. Smiling on stupidly and mincing words.
Anyway.
The second time I taught her how to ride a bike, two years later, she discovered that deep and immeasurable pleasure of a moment. She was neither back nor forward, but balanced in space-time, split-second perfection. I felt it, too, like I felt her pain when she fell. And I still do just thinking about it.
I am not unique in this experience. You maybe have something like my memory in your own memory. Maybe you still feel that sharp bristle of pain thinking about your kid falling. Maybe you can still hear the music your mom loved so much, or you sometimes catch a phantom whiff of her sweater.