The Scooter

Ethel sat in her rocker on the porch of the old folks home, watching as the little girl raced her kick scooter up and down the sidewalk. As she watched, she felt a twinge of jealousy come to her mind knowing that as a child she never had such a toy to play with.

At one time her Papa had be a successful farmer, raising milk cows and growing hay. When she was about six, that all changed with the crash of Wall Street and the Great Depression.

There was never enough money for fancy things.

By the time the depression ended, Ethel was an older teen and the idea of toys had long since passed. Then came the attack on Pearl Harbor and she joined the Army, becoming a nurse.

She didn’t have time to think of toys until she began a family of her own. By then the idea of playing with one of her girl’s dolls or tea set seemed unbecoming and she refused to do so.

Now, she was old, alone and vaguely envious of the child laughing and carrying on as she raced by the open porch along the wide sidewalk. Then Ethel felt sad for herself, for not having played more when she was younger, and now it was too late.

“Is it too late?” she asked as she answered the call for dinner.

That evening, as she looked out her bedroom window she saw the little girl’s scooter laying against the sidewalk in the gutter. An idea took hold in her as she planned to go out after everyone was in bed, and try kicking the scooter up and down the street.

Quietly, Ethel slipped out the front door and down the steps. She shuffled along the walkway to the scooter, picked it up and pushed it up and down the street.

Finally, she stepped on it and gave a gentle kick with her other foot and found herself gliding down the street with easy. Back and forth she kicked, enjoying the breeze created as it blow in her face and flitted back her gray hair.

Eventually, Ethel grew bold enough to coast back and forth on the sidewalk, taking delight in the gentle dips downward and then up as she passed over the rounded curbs of the driveways. Then it happened, she was on a flat stretch of sidewalk when she lost her balance and fell hard to the cement, bouncing half way into a yard.

There she lay, hip shattered and in pain through the remainder of the night and morning hours where a neighbor walking her dog found her. In those intervening hours, Ethel floated in and out of consciousness, certain her Papa had come to visit, stroking her head and holding her hand.

Hours later, as she lay in a hospital bed, she heard, “Whatever was that old woman thinking?”

She smiled as Papa came to her bed side, soon leaving hand-in-hand with him, a little girl once again.