Rusty the Red Trike lay huddled, face down under the weathered work bench in the corner of the dark and musty one car garage, layered with the dust and cobwebs of disrepair, surrounded by spattered cans of dried paint; discarded by his family who had outgrown him and had moved away without him to another place, to another life, to a place that they would now call home.
Vintage in age but young of heart, Rusty decided that he wasn’t ready to be discarded to the darkened corners of some grubby garage or to someone else’s fading memories of him. Nor was he satisfied with only his memories of the good times he had with his old family; screaming down the cracked sidewalks chased by Red Rover, the neighbor’s rescue dog barking hilariously behind him or trying to keep up with the big boy bikes soaring high in the sky over the wooden ramps set up in the middle of the pitted asphalt street.
Rusty was all bright and shiny back then with new red and white plastic streamers that whipped wildly from the tips of his bright red handlebars. He was happy then, but that was then…
So, Rusty rolled over onto his shredded front rubber wheel with bent and broken spokes and wobbled out of the garage, down the weed infested driveway to the alley that ran behind what he thought would be his forever home.
Looking both ways, Rusty turned and began teetering down the alleyway, full of naive hope that he would search for, find, and maybe, just maybe, relive some the memories of his past. Squeaking like an old swing in some abandoned playground, Rusty turned the corner and a rear tire fell off.
And so began the adventures and misadventures of Rusty, the Red Trike.
