Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser

Submitted by: Vince Hemingson

I suspect that all of us, at one time or another, has longed for some material possession that seemed beyond our reach. Such objects of desire blind us with their allure, dazzle us with their perfection, and make us ache for their unattainable virtues. It is human nature. We want what we can not have, reach for what is just beyond our grasp. Whatever it's guise or it's form, we have, all of us, fallen in love with the magical qualities of a Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser. And had to have it. Dreamed of having it. From Santa Claus, the birthday wish, or the year-end bonus. Because calling a Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser your very own will make us smarter, better looking and more popular. Just you wait and see.

A Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser is never more perfect than the first day you ride it. But time passes, you become a little wiser, a little more worldly, and a little less innocent. And as the chrome begins to dull, the sprocket rust and the paint chip, you realize that the Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser is just another bicycle. One that gets flat tires, catches your pant leg in the chain and is no longer as shiny as this year's new bicycle. Not as perfect. Not like the red one. The one that caught your eye in the store window.

And as time passes, the Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser no longer has the same pull at your heart strings, the same fascination nor the same power to thrill you like it first thrilled you. We are fickle creature, we humans. With fickle desires. Eventually, perhaps inevitably, the bicycle that once seemed like the center of your world will be relegated to a corner of the basement. Then moved out to the garage, and ultimately, in the manner of the way these things go, the Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser is wheeled out into the alley. Where it is abandoned to the fates and the dark forces of the universe. Perhaps with a twinge of guilt, maybe a little sadness, but more probably with a callous calculation about the limits of storage space.

The thing is, there's a little Metallic Blue Kustom Kruiser in all of us. And the back alley is not that far away.