THE MEANING OF INNOCENCE

I was sitting down having a cup of coffee the other day and looking around. The mall I was in had a basketball court nearby and some children were playing. To my left just outside the coffee shop some tables were set up and two gentlemen in wheelchairs were talking to some ladies. I thought nothing of it and thought nothing of the kids playing either because that's what kids do.

One of the gentlemen made his way to the court and when I looked up he was across from the small child and they were tossing the ball around. I looked at the kid and he had a huge smile on his face. I knew the kid was not poking fun, he was just having fun without judging a man in a wheelchair. There was a second when the world slowed down to the point where I could only focus on that brief interaction.

I saw just the man and the little boy passing around a ball and shooting baskets and thought " Why can't it always be this easy?" The kid smiled with such joy and the gentleman in the wheelchair seemed to revel in the child's joy. There was no difference, just a wheelchair, no crippled man, no scared child, just two fellow humans enjoying a common interest. That brief moment to me was the very definition of innocence.