Nic Narrates

I was dangling upside down from the swing set bar, absently listening to its squeak as Dawn and Julie discussed their upcoming joint birthday party at the roller rink.

“I’m going to do a Cherry Drop,” I said matter-of-factly, gaining momentum.

During recess at school, all the other fourth and fifth grade girls would line up at the monkey bars, taking turns. Girl after girl would hang upside down by the knees, pick up speed, and then like magic, flip off, landing on her feet to skip back into line again.

I wanted so badly to be one of those girls. One of the ones who was fearless, who knew she could do it and did. Instead, each time it was my turn, I’d swing there, drop down, and slink back into line. No flip. No hurt. No glory.

But that afternoon in my friend Dawn’s shaded backyard (it makes my palms sweaty even now from the telling), I would do it. Not because I was ready or because I knew how or because I wasn’t afraid of falling anymore. I was compelled to do it (and reasoned that a fall was maybe less painful if less public–Dawn and Julie didn’t count).

Initially, I got going pretty fast as they cheered from their swings. Minutes went by, back and forth, back and forth, as I psyched myself out about the release. I decided to hang on to the side of the swing set, just in case. And then SNAP- I did it! I flipped over!

But the hand that still hung on, pulled me backward and downward. I fell in a heap, rolling in the dried dirt beneath my broken collarbone.

I know it must have hurt, but I don’t remember how it felt. I remember the silence and the disorientation after I fell. I remember crying, asking myself “Why did I have to hang on? Why didn’t I just let go? I would have been fine!” I remember the brace I wore for the rest of the summer and how I couldn’t even sit up in bed in the morning. But the pain….I can’t tell you. It is forgotten.

It occurs to me that it is designed that way. That we live out our days in fear of such a thing, experience it and know that it has hurt us, then forget what the pain felt like. I was afraid because I didn’t want to fall and get hurt. And when I tried, I hung on to that fear still and fell hard.

Sometimes I wish the imaginable fear of falling was as forgettable as the tangible pain of crashing to the ground.

Filed under: childhood, letting go by Nic