Of Pride and Falls

This morning, Amy went into Kevin’s office to sign some papers. Angela waited in the car while Amy signed the papers. On her way out of the office, Amy said "hi" to Kevin’s co-worker, Matt, and Kevin’s boss, Ron.

Amy, it just so happens, was wearing inordinately slippery shoes this morning. After closing the glass side door behind her, she took a precarious step toward her automobile. Suddenly, without an ounce of warning, Amy’s feet flew out from underneath her. To Amy, everything happened in excruciatingly slow motion. (i.e., It took years for her to finally hit the pavement.) As her feet flew out from beneath her, she felt herself twisting in mid air, arms flailing about her wildly. During mid-fall, as the world continued to spin about her, all Amy was thinking was, "Gee, this was the certainly the wrong day to wear a skirt." She also violently cursed at her wretched shoes.

As she lay on the pavement, her hair a catastrophic mess all around her, she looked up to see horror and fright written on Angela’s face. Angela had witnessed the whole thing. Amy quickly stood up, ignoring the blood oozing out of certain strategic areas of the left side of her body, especially her left palm and her left knee cap. As she started hobbling toward Angela, Matt walked out to see if Amy was okay. (Great. They saw the whole blasted thing.) Amy waved her hand telling him she was just fine. Amy then got inside her car. When Amy realized that her clothes were okay (after all, that is the most important thing), she started laughing. Angela also started laughing. In fact, Angela laughed uncontrollably for the next ten minutes, only taking a momentary breath to tell Amy what exactly she had seen. Apparently it had been quite a sight. Angela described how Amy was there one second and gone the next. When she looked for Amy, all she could see was Amy’s body spinning horizontally in the air. Amy asked Angela, "Was it at least a graceful fall? Please tell me that it was." Angela replied: "Well, um, let me just say that it was a complicated fall."

Looking back, the only thing I really damaged this morning was my pride. As of this point in time, my sides ache more from laughing than anything else.