Oh the humiliation

Let's just say that I lack a certain grace when navigating my way through life. I sucked at PE and was always one of the last ones chosen when choosing sides for a game. My boss in high school frequently called my Grace as he quickly observed by lack thereof. It appears that the passage of time has done little to reverse my lack of physical agility. My husband, Dan, and I like to take afternoon bike rides together. At about 4:00 pm he called into me and suggested that we take a ride. The weather is nice and cool and the wind has died down considerably. The perfect conditions for a bike ride. We live near a plant gardens and it is one of our favorite spots to ride. It has a nice combination of paved bike trails that run along a creek and gravel covered trails that traverse trees of numerous varieties. My favorite part of the ride is an area where a grove of bamboo trees line the bike path to the left and on the right are a beautiful collection of blooming flowers and the creek. I yell to Dan to be sure to slow down so that we can remain in this area as long as possible. It is simply lovely. Once I learn how to upload my pictures from my camera I'll share of picture of this spot with you. We finished up our lovely ride and when we arrive home we begin to do figure 8's in our rather large driveway area. We are sharing friendly banter back and forth. It's what we do. As we do each figure 8 Dan slowly gains on me. As I am heralding his clear superiority of bike riding skills over me, he passes me and proceeds to turn left in front of me to finish out the figure 8. I had planned on going straight to put the bike into the garage. So as he moves in front me, I do what graceless people do....I fall flat on my ass! Let's just say that I was less than gracious once I had fallen. I guess you could say that I threw a temper tantrum. I started screaming at Dan, "why did you cut me off like that?!" He immediately ran over to provide aid and comfort and as he reached to touch the bruised and scrapped area, my kind response was, "get your hands off of me!" "What were you thinking?!!!" "You know that I'm not very secure on my bike." He of course tries to defend himself, but I wouldn't have it. At this juncture I pull myself up off the ground, throw my bike helmet on the ground and say, "You can put both the bikes away in the garage!" As I'm so effectively communicating with Dan, I'm also having waves of pain wash over my right shin, left calf, left wrist, and right palm. It's the worst part of falling, those several minutes immediately following the fall, where you're body slowly awakens to the fact that you've damaged it in some way. The pain builds rapidly, with pulsating waves of pain. You just hold on, hoping that eventually the body will reach some sort of equilibrium where the pain finally lifts. Finally, the pained lifted along with my pissy attitude. My daughter, Chelsea, ran to get some ice and was wonderfully compassionate and caring...all good signs for a budding doctor. Dan continued to provide aid and comfort. All is right with the world again.

This experience highlights something that I've been thinking about lately. Since spring has brought warmer temperatures, I've started riding my bike again for exercise. What I've noticed since riding again is how unsure I am on the bike. I find myself being so very cautious. Bottom line I don't trust myself to be able to handle something unexpected on the road. I think this lack of confidence on the bike is directly linked to my childhood and adolescent experiences from PE class and other athletic attempts. Am I really that horrible at sports, or were my initial attempts at sports negative and as a result I developed this view of myself of non-athletic? Dan keeps telling me that I am capable, but I just don't believe him. Isn't it amazing how deeply ingrained our self views can become? Is it possible that my self doubt when it comes to anything related to sports has become a self fulfilling prophesy? Maybe I need to work on letting go of the non-athletic label and work toward developing a more confident attitude toward my athletic abilities.

Time to change the subject to reality TV. Tonight Dancing with the Stars and the Bachelor are on. This season's Dancing with the Stars has been a bit of a snoozefest. For some reason this collection of celebrities are just not connecting with me. Kristi Yamaguchi is so far ahead of the rest that for me it's already a done deal. The Bachelor, on the other hand, is not disappointing. Tonight the Bachelor visits the hometowns and meets the families of the four remaining girls. One of the girls, Shane, has been hiding the true identity of her actor father, but in last week's preview it was revealed that her father is none other than Lorenzo Lamas of Falcon Crest fame. The Bachelor looked like he was going to s**t a brick when Lorenzo was warning him not to hurt his daughter. You've got to love the passion of a Latin father to protect the honor of his daughter. It should be very interesting -- to steal a classic line from Laugh In. I've also been watching the 24/7 live feed for Big Brother 9. They are down to the final four and the houseguests have been in lockdown for the past 24 hours. This means that they have been locked inside the house, prohibited from going outside. Lock four people up in a house together and there is bound to be drama. Ryan is in an alliance with Adam and Sharon. Sharon is in an alliance with Ryan and Sheila. Sheila is in an alliance with Adam and Sharon. Adam is in an alliance with all three. Even though I'm privey to many of the private conversations between these people, I'm clueless as to who is really telling the truth to whom. The current status is that Ryan is HOH (head of household), he has nominated Sheila and Sharon, and he also won the POV. The question tonight is whether not he will use the power of veto by pulling either Sheila or Sharon off the block. If he does, then this means that Adam goes up on the block. If he leaves his nominates as they are, then Adam has the power to evict either Sharon or Sheila. So the conversations this past weekend and today have revolved around whether or not Ryan will use the POV and if not, what will Adam do. Both Sheila and Sharon have been campaigning heavily and at about 6:00 pm tonight the live feed was cut. It is assumed that they would be holding the POV ceremony, immediately followed by the eviction ceremony, which then would lead into the first of three competitions for HOH. Whoever wins HOH gets to pick who will be in the final two with him/her. So tonight is a crucial night.