The Cover of the Book

I found myself randomly thinking about a childhood memory today. It was when I was little, probably around 8, and I went to a local fair with a friend. Brimming with excitement, we chose a "big girl"  ride - a looming candy-apple red contraption that looked very much like a sitting mechanical octopus. We climbed into the dangling square cars adamant that this ride was going to be cool. But it was not cool, was it?

No, no it was not. The whole ride rose up a few feet and then proceeded to spin us about violently, our little cars tilting at crazy angles (you know...physics and such). And as my little 8 year old self slid around behind the harness, because these rides were not "one size fits all", I found myself squished against the far side of the car, watching the vast expanse of nothing and then ground fly by, as my cheek smashed against the disgustingly sticky red metal side, screaming over my friend's similar cries-"I want to get off! I want to get off! I want my mommy! I want my mommy!". Although...it probably sounded more like a high-pitched "Iwantmymmm."

Somehow, over the screams of glee of other passengers and my own frantic cries, a young man yelled out from the car behind us at the top of his lungs,
"It's ok sweetheart! It's ok! I've been on this ride 5 times! It's almost over! You're doing good! One more turn!"
And he continued on like that. Instead of enjoying his time on the ride, he stopped to scream to a little girl he couldn't even see that everything was ok, and he talked me through the rest of the ride, each time saying,
"One more turn! You're ok sweetheart! One more turn!"

The ride ended, my friend and I fumbled with shaking hands to unlatch the harness, each crying over what seemed at the time a "near death experience". But the young man who had talked me through the ride had thrown off his harness and dashed around to our car to help us, asking-
"You okay now sweetie? Let's find your mommy."

I had wanted to hug him then and there, despite his spiked bright orange mohawk and the crazy metal piercings that ran through his nose and eyebrows. Despite the studded leather jacket with the sleeves ripped off and the heavy eye-liner he had smeared around his eyes. Despite the tattoos of dragons and skulls littering his arms. He and his matching girlfriend walked both my friend and I back to my friend's mom, patting our back the whole time, telling us how brave we were.

I have always credited my parents for teaching my sisters and I the importance of  not judging people by their looks, but that young man was really the one who hit the message home for me. He was not a punk guy who liked to smash things under his biker boots. He wasn't an arsonist, he wasn't a mean low-life. He was just a guy who liked to wear his hair up and orange, just a guy who liked tattoos. He was just a guy who thought it was important to comfort a crying little girl on a scary fair ride.