Sometimes

Sometimes the sun doesn't break through the thundering clouds.
Sometimes the cavalry doesn't arrive in the nick of time.
Sometimes, despite your best efforts, you lose.

God knows I've been there. At times, it's felt like I've lived there. Maybe I still am. Maybe when you've been defeated so many times, you start looking at defeats as the norm. It's the way of the world, you tell yourself. You adopt an ironic attitude with a drenching of fatalism and a sprinkling of desert dry wit. And what you dream...those are dreams for your next life.

I understand this. I know how easy it is to give up and how hard it is to go on when you've learned your dreams are too big and life is too hard. The wind breaks the butterfly's wings; the rain drowns the tiny scurrying hearts.

Still...it's not comfortable accepting defeat. You gain nothing by sitting there in your sorrows except the satisfaction of telling the world that you won't play anymore. It won't have you to kick around. You'll just withdraw. Take your toys and go home.

I guess, for some people, that's enough. The world beat them; they accept their defeat with grace and take pride in that.

But me...I'm stubborn. You're stubborn. There's nothing wrong with taking a break, catching our breath, having a bit of rest to recharge. But we have to get back out there. We have to face the wind and trek through the driving rain. Yeah, our dreams are big, but who wants small ones?

Remember, things don't happen to us; we happen to things. The world has teeth, that is true, but...friends, we got fangs.

(For CK)