Many years ago my Ex and I went to visit his brothers' family in Thomaston, GA. Someone came up with the idea of going to Sprewell Bluff (pronounced "spurl" by the locals) on the Flint River. Ex had told me about it and I had always wanted to see it, so off we went.
It's a truly beautiful place and I was having a great time. There are several trails and a few sharp drop-offs to the river below; it's really scenic.
Ex decides to explore "off the beaten path".
Now at the time I would have followed him anywhere. See how we get in trouble, Girls?! So I started to follow him down toward the river on a very steep trail.
The Devil Is In The Details. Little things are very often what gets us in the a..........end. Like slick-soled tennis shoes, pine straw and pea-gravel. Separately, they are shoes, straw, and rocks. Put them all together and add roughly (very roughly) 175 lbs. of Clumsy Chick. Point all of THAT downhill.
Give it a shove.
By the time I realized I was in trouble things (meaning ME) were already out of control. Picture skiing downhill, really fast. Minus the skis.
At least I was upright, and not on my ass.
Someone had placed a pine tree in my path! How thoughtful! Looks like I'm gonna stop my decent one way or another. And it looks like it might hurt.
Crash into a tree, or, fly off of a cliff and splatter on rocks and quite possibly drown????
"I'll take the tree, Monty."
It truly is amazing how FAST the mind works! I thought: "If I can grab a-hold of the tree, I can stop."
In theory, it should have worked.........
Oh, I grabbed the tree alright but all this did was cause me to whip AROUND the tree. I'm sure there is some sort of explanation involving physics but I'll be dipped if I know what it is.
I lost my grip---and some skin---on the aforementioned pine and now I'm sliding BACKWARDS. I'm also bent over trying to dig my fingernails into Terra Firma and wondering if I was going off a ledge into the river. At this point I'm no longer sure where exactly the damned river is.
And I'm picking up speed.
I suppose Ex heard what he thought was an avalanche and looked up to see my backside barreling toward him.
Bless his heart, he caught me!! He might be regretting that now, but he had to haul me back up the trail by my waistband. I couldn't seem to get my feet and legs to work anymore.
Of course his folks saw the whole show. Damn. All his brother said was "There are bears in these woods." What that has to do with his sis-in-law careening down a slippery slope, I have no idea. So I snapped back that if there was a bear in those woods he didn't have a hair on his a**! Mountain goats, maybe. Bears, no.
My hands were skinned up, my heart was pounding, and my dignity was a little bruised.
I'll still go on nature trails but I'm more cautious now. My dignity won't survive much more!
"I'll take the tree, Monty."
ReplyDelete:-) Delightful!
Pearl
There used to be a game show called "Let's Make Deal" and the host was Monty Hall. That's where I got that from. Hopefully, you are too young to remember Monty Hall. It's damned hard to make a deal with The Fates sliding downhill and that cursed pine tree looked like my only hope!
DeleteYeah, I know the feeling of sliding down hill. In fact it was during a National Guard drill weekend. Complicating matters even more I had asked, and was promptly denied by the First Sergeant, to have that weekend off because I had family visiting from out of town.
ReplyDeleteWhile the slide down the hill was no big deal I sprained my left ankle very badly and was sent home. Long story short as the medics were treating me the First Sergeant kept looking at me like it was all a scam.
OUCH! I know that had to hurt, Beach Bum!
DeleteI have suffered with baaad headaches all of my adult life. Because I've had them for so long I have learned how to cope with them and still take care of business, to a degree. I get the feeling most people think it's a scam for sympathy.