War of Self-Worth

Yesterday, as I heard the tank-tanking of rain on my metal roof, my eyes fixed upon two children playing in the rain. Two naïve souls, clad in bright crimson galoshes that clashed with their cliché brilliant yellow rain coats, trudged through puddles as if they had not a care in the world. Both children had a toothless smile splashed across their cheeks. As the children were playing, an elderly man, saturated with age, and crippled by the weight of the rain on his shoulder paused on the sidewalk next to the children. An emotion of panic erased the children’s smiles as they ran inside. I sighed to watch the aged man limp on alone and right as I was to turn from my window, I saw the younger of the two children, in nothing but a t-shirt and ruby galoshes, stumble out of his front door with a golden bundle overwhelming his arms. In the corner of my picture window, the man looked down to the boy extending his tiny arms. There lay the rain poncho that the boy had worn not five minutes before. The man hesitated and took the rainwear from the child as he watched him gallop back into the front door where a mother was watching nervously. Then, and I write in all honesty, the man slung the petite raincoat over his shoulders and looked to see if anyone was watching. As he tip-toed over to the puddle and stepped a foot in, he wiped something from his face. Whether it was a raindrop or a tear, I’ll never know.