Thursday, January 17, 2013

(Literal) Mountain Bike Demons

The twinge of a rock solid, head splitting crack to my occipital lobe as I desperately tried to extract myself from a place I never should have been was not enough to stop me from breaking into laughter, nervous as it was.  Such is the nature of a good scare and quite startling coming from someone who doesn't generally scare easily, especially in such a cartoonish manner; jumping straight up in the air, hesitating, feet spinning aimlessly in circles while trying to gain traction in the nothingness, eyes springing in and out of my skull before falling ass over tea kettle backwords in the dirt, trying to escape.
Running scared

If it wasn't for the uproar of laughter from my friend Trever, who took great pleasure in my circumstance, I am not sure I would have regained my usual skin color let alone a steady heartbeat.  His timing was impeccible and welcome.  With his laughter as confirmation, I felt the blood rush back into my checks as well as a powerful sense of irony.  Afterall, this prank was largely played out on myself or, at the very least, at the expense of my undeniable curiosity, predicated by someone who is far too familiar with my kind.  You know, the kind of person who can't resist looking.   Surely the execution of this gag came from deep within its creator too.  I believe him to be a kindred spirit who is also compelled beyond his own better judgement.  He is a person driven to put his nose where it doesn't belong (quite literally in this case) and this was a lesson meant to be experienced by someone who never learns from experience.

Trever was lucky and witnessed my folly and therefore he knew better.  I imagine when he was young and saw someone get burned on a stove, he was much less inclined to touch said stove than perhaps certain others.  His wife, on the other hand,  who is smart as whip and not prone to such folly either, arrived late on the scene and was oblivious to what just happened.   Worse yet, she knew nothing about the redemption I required.  It took some coaxing but I was able to convince her to follow my example and, to my delight and her horror, I witnessed my own unravelling through her reaction.

The lesson I took away from this experience was this:  When you find yourself in the middle of nowhere and confronted by strangely peculiar things, there are a few important questions that you should stop and ask yourself; decisions you should make.  Is it really truly wise to stick your head inside a tiny window that leads to nowhere?  If this window is completely out of place; completely unnatural in the most natural of settings; completely dark and dingy and barely big enough to fit your fat head without contorting your body and craning your neck perfectly sideways ... should you really choose to stick your head inside?
En route to face our demons

We all have our own fears and doubts and manifestations of that which frightens us most.  Each of us has our own demons that haunt us and keep us awake at night and sneak up on us when we least expect it but sometimes those demons are just a lot more real than we ever thought possible ... and things can get real fun when we unleash them on our friends.







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