Stumbling

Yesterday I went for a run with my five-year-old and my dog. I didn't want to run. It was Saturday. I wanted to sleep and eat and sleep some more. But the dog was overeager and the five-year-old was holding me to the promise I had made earlier in the week that he could ride his bike alongside of me while I ran on Saturday.

So, there we are, running along, only a few blocks from home when I realize I am falling toward the ground. In my head I'm thinking "Roll! Roll!" I finished with a roll, but my knees and hands took the majority of the beating. I lay there on my back at the side of the road in pain and humiliation with my dog and son hovering over me to see if I'm okay.

I was honestly hurt enough that I couldn't just get up and walk away. I lay there with my bleeding hands and knees in the air trying to figure out how to get up without using said hands or knees. A concerned elderly gentleman came out of his house to see if I was okay. It was kind of him, and I assured him I just had some scrapes and bruises, but I was embarrassed. I was just running along and I tripped over an uneven sidewalk.

Apologizing to Joshua, I told him mommy was too hurt to keep running, and we'd have to go home. He was bummed, but saw the evidence dripping down my leg and road home without complaining. As I walked I felt my knee swelling and my hands throbbing. By the time I got home I had two goose eggs on my knee with lots of gravel lodged inside. Ouch.

I hate falling. I hate looking foolish. And I hate feeling stupid.

Being a teacher, I think there must be a lesson in here somewhere. Maybe it's that I feel the same about tripping up in life.

I don't like it.

If I had my choice I'd be perfect. I'm not a perfectionist (I actually have an unhealthy fear of them), I just don't like to mess up. And I think I have some solid reasons for that.

1) Falling hurts - my knee is still sore to the touch, and hurts to bend or straighten. Because of the pain I can't do all of the things that I normally do. I have to rest and nurse myself back to health. I need help from others and patience. This annoys me, and I don't like pain.

2) Tripping is embarrassing - we all know that this was our greatest fear at high school/middle school graduation - that we'd trip and fall on the stage in front of everyone. Real life isn't any better. When people see me mess up, I get embarrassed. I don't want the whole world to know how imperfect I am, how often I mess up, and I don't want them judging me for it.

Even my five-year-old, who is used to falling and hurting himself (a lot) commented that mommies don't usually fall down. "I know," I said, "I just wasn't paying attention to my feet. See, we all trip and fall sometimes." Maybe seeing me fall makes him feel better about his record, but I fear that it opens his eyes to how weak and vulnerable I really am and makes him insecure (kind of like it does to me).

3) The evidence takes a while to clean up - I look like I had some sort of accident, but with no cool story to go with it, just some gross scabs. So, whenever I'm wearing shorts for the next few days people will likely ask me what happened. My response will probably be something like, "I'm a big dork." I keep thinking that this is not what God wants me to say, but that's all my embarrassment can come up with. Somehow I think that slamming myself first will preempt the obvious judgment they will come to.

But, as I was journaling this morning and talking to God about my fall I felt like he asked me, "Leah, who are you really?"

"I know, I'm not a dork, I'm still a daughter of the King."

Pretty cool that a banged up mess like me can still carry a title like that, I just don't know if I'll have the courage to use it when people look at my knee in disgust (or maybe sympathy) and ask what happened.

"I'm a dork" still feels more fitting. I guess that's what's so amazing about grace.

Gymnastic Dreams

Raise your hand if you have been staying up too late watching Olympians win gold this last week. Michael Phelps has rocked Beijing, but my favorite is the women's gymnastics.

Nastia Liukin is a picture of beauty and grace. Shawn Johnson is a powerhouse of perfection. And I am not a little impressed with their cool under pressure. Watching them go one, two in the individual all-around competition was fantastic, though my husband and I almost developed stomach ulcers as we literally held our breath through every routine.

You probably don't know this about me, but I once had dreams of Olympic gymnastics myself. When I was a little girl I begged my mom to wait in the hours-long line to sign me up for gymnastics at the park district. Thankfully, she gave in. This is significant because my mom is not a patient person. She made me wait with her, but I didn't mind. The line wound around the gymnasium, past the vault and near my favorite uneven bars. I was pursuing my Olympic dreams.

My body has a decently athletic build and ability, the only problem is my mind. It is filled with a lot of imagination, but not much mental toughness or tenacity. I once almost got a black eye when attempting a back-walk-over. My leg knew it was supposed to go over, but my brain had second thoughts and hesitated. My knee crashed into my eye socket and I went down. Thankfully no major bruise ever formed.

In second grade there was a girl in my class, Chris Adams, that could do flip flops all across the playground. I would ask her to do them again and again. I loved Chris Adams. I, on the other hand, could only do one flip flop when spotted really well. But I could run and jump over that vault, swing around the uneven bars and point my toes like no other.

One of my favorite, and most humorous, memories of my dad is when he pulled me aside one day and told me that if I wanted to he would support my desire to go all the way with gymnastics. He would support my Olympic dreams. I love him to death for the memory, but even at the time I think I knew it was a little unrealistic. You see, I never was able to progress past "advanced beginners."

I watched anything I could about Nadia Comaneci. I saw how in her native Romania they came into her school and picked her out to begin training at a young age. I waited, but no one came for me. Then she went into a gym with her own personal coaches and they formed her, not only into an Olympic gymnast, but into the greatest gymnast who had ever lived. She was the first to receive a perfect "10." I, on the other hand, watched as a select few walked into our room for "intermediates." These were the girls with potential. I was not one of them.

After filling my mind with all of these dreams, I had one of my own, while I slept. I can still picture it in my mind - leaping and flipping on the balance beam (the apparatus I feared most) and sticking every landing. I was sleeping over at a friend's house when I had the dream. I won gold. I was the best. And then I woke up. It had seemed so real that I cried when I realized it was just a dream. My Olympic hopes would never become a reality. I was 10 years old, already too old to hope.

Now I watch these girls twist and turn in seemingly impossible feats of strength and athleticism with my three-year-old daughter. She gets up and spins and says she wants to do "ballet" like them. And in the pit of my stomach I feel the hopes of a dream rekindle. Maybe I should sign her up for tumbling. She may have gotten her pole vaulter father's mental focus and ability to stay airborne.

But no, I don't want to be one of those parents putting my dreams onto my children. But I have to say, Olympic dreams die hard, even when you never get past advanced beginners.