Balcony Blunders

I was not particularly graceful in my youth (shocking, I know). Several of you who read this blog can attest to that, and you also know that my lack of gracefulness in my pre-adolescence and teenage years has definitely carried over into adulthood. But I’m not as accident-prone as I USED to be! My incidents of falling and dropping things (and sitting on things!) have been pretty few and far between in the past year. My last “serious” injury was when I was packing the moving truck with Joel and Nathan, to move here, and I fell UP the steel ramp (not DOWN it like normal people fall)--- you know, the ramp covered with razor sharp metal teeth. I came away with lovely Zorro-looking “Z”'s on my knees and a few gashes in my hands for the long drive up to Washington. Usually my “oops” incidents are self-induced because I’m hurrying or trying to do too much at once. I am the one-trip QUEEN! Telling myself, “I can totally do this in one trip!” has gotten me into trouble more times than I can say.

Well, I’ve been pretty safe recently except for our balcony. It’s out to get me! Our apartment has a back balcony with a metal railing and not much room for doing much of anything, but we store things out there and occasionally sit out there. A few nights ago I almost tripped over a bucket out there, and it brought to mind the idea for this blog entry.

The kids use their skateboard out on the balcony to “practice” balancing and going back and forth on the board. The other night I went out there (late-after dark) and completely forgot about the skateboard. I didn’t turn the outside light on because I didn’t want to be seen, and well---I don’t THINK anyone saw me NOT SEE the skateboard and- yes- I stepped right on it and took a little ride along the railing, lost my footing, legs went out from under me, and I landed pretty hard, seriously crashing into the railing and breaking my fall with my wrist. I thought I may have broken my wrist at first. I sat there with the wind kind of knocked out of me, skateboard wheels still spinning, and I just started LAUGHING because it was so ridiculous. It was something straight out of a Looney Tunes short or some old silent slapstick comedy movie. No one was awake in the house, so I was able to just enjoy the humility of the moment all by myself. I’m OK but my wrist still isn’t right and I may need to go get it looked at. Could have been much worse, eh?!?

My Christmas decorations were not so lucky. The day we got our Christmas tree, I went out in the evening to get the decorations out of the balcony storage closet. It was VERY windy, cold, and raining at the time, and things were quite slippery out there. I keep our Christmas decorations in a few big plastic Rubbermaid bins. I was hurrying to get them out of the closet quickly, but there were other boxes on top of them, so I kept stacking boxes against the metal railing until I found the Rubbermaid containers, then stacked THEM onto the other SMALLER boxes I had already stacked---so the stack against the metal railing was getting higher and less stable--- but I thought, “It’s just for a few minutes; it’s OK”. You see, I was IN THE MODE (the same mode I get in with the one-trip nonsense). Mark and the kids were inside helplessly looking on (I found out later that Mark was watching me stack the boxes and got increasingly worried but didn’t feel he should say anything. Smart man.) Sure enough, the wind picked up and toppled the LARGEST container over the railing (well, I MAY have bumped it, but that’s not verifiable). And of course the largest container was ON TOP of the other SMALLER boxes, all swaying in the blustery Northwest wind, and it flew right over the edge of the balcony. Sailed down three stories!! Thank the Lord no one was standing below, because I didn’t even have time to say “Look out below!”—it happened so fast. I think I may have even reached for the bin once I realized it was starting to go overboard, but there was no possible way I could have gotten it without going down with it. I heard LOTS of glass breaking as it hit the ground below. I cringed. It was one of those moments where you just look around and ask yourself, “Did that really just happen?” Followed by visions of me super-gluing our precious decorations from Christmases past... ...So we went down and salvaged what we could—which surprisingly was a lot. It was mostly lights in that bin-- thank the Lord again! I was glad I didn’t go over the edge with it…again, could have been much worse!

If someone followed me around with a video camera long enough, they just might eventually get something on tape worthy of AFV’s $10,000 cash prize. Or at least stupidvideos.com! For now, I’m being extra-careful out on that balcony.

My Mom likes to buy T-shirts with kooky sayings on them. I need one that says "I do all my own stunts."