Leapfrogging Into Pain and Humiliation

On Saturday the Singles headed up to Oklahoma City for our annual trip to eat at Ted's Cafe Escondido. It started a few years back when some of us went to OKC for a conference, had lunch at Ted's and fell in love with it. Is the food there really good enough to warrant a 2 1/2 hour drive? Probably not. Still, we look at it as a nice day-trip, a way to get out of town for a bit, and we try to schedule something to do afterwards; last year it was visiting the OKC memorial, this year it was the botanical gardens in Bricktown. It was there in Bricktown where the second humiliating and painful event of my week took place.

After we had finished touring the gardens, we started the long trek back to our bus. Along the way there were quite a few large posts sticking up out of the ground; I turned to Li'l Dill and jokingly suggested that he try to recreate the scene in That Thing You Do where Giovanni Ribissi leapfrogs over the parking meter and breaks his arm -- do you see where this is headed? The Anti-Cap'n and Li'l Dill both take me up on the leapfrogging suggestion, each clearing the post with ease. I, being of neither sound mind nor body, think to myself "well, that looks easy enough . . ."

When will I learn?

Now, it wasn't trying to get over the top of the post that was the problem; I got the upward momentum just fine. It was the forward momentum that caused me problems, as I miscalculated how much force would be necessary to propel myself all the way past the unusually wide post. I came down hard on the far side of the post, which then sent me hurtling face forward to the ground; I was able to keep from totally face-planting, but wound up scraping up my knee and nearly pulling something in my leg doing so. But the leg wasn't what was really bothering me; no, my true pain and discomfort came courtesy of my poor, battered tailbone. The only witnesses to my display of clumsiness were The Anti-Cap'n, Li'l Dill, and Cap'n Bubbles, and at the time I tried to keep the true level of my discomfort to myself, hoping that it would soon pass -- no such luck. I honestly don't know if my tailbone’s bruised, fractured, broken, or what; all I know is that, five days later, it still hurts to sit in a normal chair for any length of time. It hurts a bit less each day, which I'm taking as a good sign, but it's still danged uncomfortable.

The incident put me into a mild state of depression for a couple of different reasons. The first was just the fact that the injury was going to play havoc with any attempts to work out outside of maybe swimming, and I'm pretty bound and determined not to let anyone anywhere see me in a swimsuit anytime in the near future. Realizing that my attempts to get in shape have to be put on the back-burner for however long it takes me to heal -- not exactly a morale booster. The second bit of depression came from this neurotic idea that the incident was indicative of all of my attempts to be one of the guys: that every time I tried to do something physical I wind up injuring myself (tailbone, ankle, knee, hacking up carpet fuzz, etc.), that I was just a lost cause, laughingstock, total loser, etc., etc . . . . you know, the usual junk that clogs my dark and twisty brain. I'm pulling out of the spiral now, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before I bite off more than I can chew and wind up shamed, in pain, and full of self-doubt again.*

*On a related note, I think PigPen has started to suspect that trying to break me out of my negative thought patterns is going to be harder than he thought . . .