LARGETONY Blog

God reminded me today that I am not twelve years old anymore.

I love being in the woods. I played in the woods all the time as a kid. Like when I was twelve years old. There was a game we used to play where one of us would go into the woods ahead of the other and hide. After waiting a couple of minutes, the other person would come into the woods and try to find out where you were hiding before you ambushed him and tagged him. Then you would run like hell to get out of the woods before he could tag you back (read: kick your ass).

More often than not, unless you were just seriously faster than your opponent, you were going to get tagged back. So, the trick was to make the most of the ambush and do something to scare the hell out him. Sometimes it was hiding in the trees and leaping down on him or sometimes it was hiding in a ditch and reaching up to grab his ankle as he ran by. In the wild, anything goes. It was amazing how easily you could make someone piss their pants even though they were expecting it.

It was the first beautiful day in a while in Tennessee today. Barely a cloud in the sky and the temperature actually got up into the high forties. Doesn’t sound very warm I know, but considering it has been at least 20 degrees cooler for the past week or two, it felt like skinny-dipping weather. So, the attorney and I took a hike in the mountains to enjoy the sun and relative warmth.

I mentioned before that he is athletic. He also has a competitive streak and was taunting me about how he could beat me in a foot race. He probably can. He’s got a little bit longer leg than me and he’s a runner. He runs several days a week for exercise. Now, I can run. but I don’t do it just for the sake of running. I’ll run on a basketball court or I’ll run from something chasing me. But just running from point “a” to point “b”? I don’t get it. Even cheetahs and gazelles don’t run just to be running. They run to or away from something.

So, anyway, he’s got a couple of advantages so I’m pretty sure he could out run me. On a track or pavement. But I grew up running through the woods like it was “Lord of Flies” (only with more clothing) and I’m fifteen years younger. He’s lived a whole childhood more than me. I figured that cross-country, over rocks and logs and creeks, I could smoke him. He doubted it, so there was nothing left to do but prove it. We decided to race back down the mountain trail.

He got ahead of me at one point. Still, I was right on his heels. But, because of the narrowness of the path, it was hard to get around him. We got to a point where the trail doubles back on itself like an “S.” So, I figured, “screw these curves, I’ll just cut across and head him off.”

I still had my twelve year old legs and “surfed” down a bank of leaves to the lower level where the trail cut back. That put me a good 4-5 seconds ahead. There was another cut back again on the other side of a ditch. Lucky for me (or unlucky once you hear the result) there was a tree down across the ditch. I skirted my size fourteens over the log like I was a ballerina, slipped on the moss growing on it, and BAM!…went down like the clumsy moose I really am.

One foot slipped off, making my other knee slam down on the tree, then I spun off onto my back into the ditch. I busted my knee open and that’s when I remembered my legs are now thirty-one.

You know how babies will walk into tables and tumble down stairs and get up giggling like they didn’t feel a thing? If they cry at all, it’s because they were frightened, not because of pain. When does all that change? I don’t think that I was frightened at any moment of my stumble, but it sure did hurt like hell. Still does. I didn’t realize just how bad I busted my knee until I got home. It turns out I tore off most of my skin (I tore a hole in my magic britches, too.) and it hurts to bend it. It hurts to stand up. It hurts to sit down. It hurts to kneel. And I have to take the stairs so stiff-legged that you’d think I had a boner in tight pants.

Surprisingly, nothing else was hurt…but my pride. As soon as he realized I was basically okay, the attorney laughed his ass off and told me that’s what I get for cheating. In my opinion, I don’t see it as cheating. I was making the most of an opportunity. In the wild, anything goes.

I guess God felt the same way when he busted my knee open. Anything goes. Even my magic britches.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 11th, 2007 at 11:36 pm and is filed under attorney, being tony. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.