From My Notebook: Little Red Ball

The ball soars upward, a streak of red in the perfect blue sky. When will it come back down to my waiting hands? Was I really that strong to throw it so high? 

But then I realize; it’s not coming down.

I gaze up at it, a small red dot, growing ever smaller. I laugh and wave good bye to it. It is free, rising above the world of gravity; through chilly clouds, past soaring birds. Brave little ball, how scary it must be to be the first to show the world that laws are only words. 

Up and up it climbs, what a view it must see! For an instant I wish I could be up there with it, to be so free. But life still holds me bound to earth at the will of gravity. Still further up it goes, past comets and shooting stars. Will it return home? What a brave little ball, shining up in the galaxies, brighter and happier than any star around it. 

“Billy, are you going to toss me the ball?” I hear daddy’s voice. I flinch, back in the real world. 

Looking down I see that same little red ball in my hands. I laugh again and toss it to dad.

“Don’t worry, little ball, I know where you’ve been!” I whisper to it as it flies through the air, up and up, free! Then gravity pulls it back, the invisible leash drawing tight. 

It arches gracefully and lands in my dad’s hand.

The Car Drive Home

The road stretches on and on, into blankness and all I see are pairs of red brake light of the cars ahead; the white headlights of the cars rushing past and all of these floating lights being caught in the raindrops on the windshield, creating millions of tiny stars. The music on the stereo takes the main stage over conversation as I gaze out the black windows, absorbed in my own thoughts. I think about an upcoming writing competition I’m about to enter into. With all the competitions I’ve ever entered in my life (mostly coloring pages from the local newspaper when I was little) I have never won a single one, never even gotten feedback from them. All these memories of failed competitions make me wonder what’s the use of entering another one? There will always be someone better at what I do out there and the judges will always pick them. But then a quote comes to mind,

“Use talents you posses; the woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.”

 And then I realize the point of competitions is not so much to win, but to do your very best, to always be pushing yourself further and to fail gracefully. For it is how we deal with failure that says who we really are, not our number of accomplishments. So I resolve, right here, on this quite drive home; that I will never give up, even if my failures are 100 to 1. Because I know that every rejection of my work only makes me better, and I never know when this next entry will be the one that’ll win. My hopes rise high, and as we get closer to home, closer to the end of the car trip, I look up to the beautiful stars that sprinkle the night sky. They may be obscured by the lights of this world and the clouds and rain, but still they are there, hidden jewels, waiting for their time to shine.