A Kid Always Wants a Bike

I’ve just come from a wild and fun night out with my family. My mind is a bit tired, and it’s probably going to show in how vague this is maybe it will even lack coherence but here we go…

A couple of weeks ago I decided that every Sunday I would watch a good movie I hadn’t seen before. Today it was Hearts in Atlantis (2001), directed by Scott Hicks. Although I won’t talk about the film itself, there was a line that captured me: “a kid always wants a bike…” a metaphor that might not even be intentional in the dialogue, yet it managed to catch my attention for the rest of the film (and what a good decision that was).

I stopped for a moment to think about that line, and as I drifted through my memories, I found myself looking back at a 7 years old Christian, dreaming every day about that bike, wishing it, imagining what it would be like to discover new places riding with his friends.

For me the bicycle was everything on my mind. It captured all my attention. I spent my days imagining what kind of rims I wanted it to have, what color, what tires… And that whole year went by like that, the bicycle always on my mind until one special Christmas night, it finally appeared. It wasn’t the color I imagined, it wasn’t the design I had pictured, it didn’t have the tires I dreamed of. IT WAS MUCH BETTER. That bike gave me many years of good memories that I still keep intact in my mind, even as time slowly and sadly begins to dissolve them.

This made me think: how many times, as an adult, have I obsessed over something that much? How many times have I spent an entire day longing for just one thing? How many times have those things actually materialized? After carefully examining my answers, I discovered something: it hasn’t happened often that kind of deep desire, focusing all my positive thoughts and intentions on one single thing. But the few times I have done it, wonderful things have happened. Those ideas did materialize.

Then another thought came to me. For a couple of years, I lived without that feeling, without really wanting something that much, until recently talking with one of my best friends, someone I consider an absolute cracked-dev, he told me: “you can.” Those two simple words clicked with this idea of getting back into IT, improving my habits, reconnecting with my passion for cybersecurity, and putting my entire life in order. And once again, I found myself wanting that bicycle this time in the shape of something we like to call The Plan.

And how is The Plan going? Christmas hasn’t arrived yet. Maybe we’re still in summer… And even though I haven’t reached it, The Plan has already given me purpose, conviction, a whole new way to live my life, giving meaning to everything I do even when all I’m doing is watching a movie.

Will the bicycle arrive? I still don’t know just like I didn’t know back then. But in the meantime, I’ll keep working on The Plan, thinking about The Plan, redesigning The Plan, touching The Plan, breathing The Plan because that’s what it’s about, isn’t it? If we’re going to live, let it have meaning.

Always be that kid who wants the bike.