One carefully avoided – although just in time – the crack in the sidewalk.
The other, the younger of the two, being blissfully unaware of how huge a misstep stepping on a concrete expansion joint really is – second only to stepping on the other’s shadow (not polite) – toddled alongside.
With time and practice though, hand-in-hand with his big brother, he’d learn these life lessons.
His big brother did know, or thought he knew, the danger of it all.
Somehow, for some reason, it was important.
Grandpa said so.
‘An absolute no-no for children,’ his grandfather would say.
Sometimes he – the grandfather, now in his seventies – even himself remembers, smiles, and adjusts his stride.
The steps we take, the shadows we cast, somehow, it’s important.
My dad was a scientist and told me to not step on cracks because they were ground faults that could open up and swallow me by stepping on them. Riding bicycles across was too quick for the fault to respond. My dad knew of what he spoke, so I believed him, and I’m still here as proof.