Tuesday, January 12, 2010

When you get to the end of your rope!

I remember as a  young girl around 10-11 years of age, my dad put a rope up on the back of our basketball hoop. He was into creating things and so it was higher and stronger than most hoops. I was grateful that he did that because in school... one of the physical tests in gym was to climb a rope. I never really understood why that was necessary, couldn't think of any reason that I would need that skill in my life but ...nevertheless it was part of the test.

I would practice over and over again and never really had much success, the difference in our rope and the one at school was this... the school rope had a knot in it but you had to climb to get it. Mine on the other hand had a knot at the bottom and so at least you had a little success right at the beginning. I finally after many many tries  got to the top and man, was I excited. I was in a hurry to get down and run in the house to tell my family what I had done. I figured coming down had to be the easiest part, because all you had to do was slide down real fast. Well, since I had never been to the top OR never slide down before, I didn't realize how badly it was going to burn my hands. It hurt so bad that I pulled my hands away just for a moment but I was still too far from the ground, when I fell I broke my toe. I knew it was broke but I was so embarrassed and in so much pain ...plus I was scared to go to the hospital, that I hid it from my parents. I wore covered shoes (which was a painful experience) till I got down the road ( 3/4's of a  mile ) to the bus stop and then I would put on sandals. I wrapped it as tight as I could to the big toe but finally after it healed, I was left with a crooked toe.

So there has got to be some lesson learned here right? A couple of things come to mind. Practice makes perfect, but even though you understand maybe one part of your test, you may not completely comprehend the next part. Or maybe I should have just hung on and yelled for help, maybe by asking someone who had already learned the art of climbing rope...could have talked me down safely.

I do believe that both lessons are important...there are so many things in life that when I finally get to a certain point, I think I am done with the learning and low and behold there is much, much more. Life truly is about ever learning. Some lessons are harder than the others. I also think it would have been a great idea to have yelled for help. Why is it that we sometimes wait too long before we ask for help? Often trying to do everything by ourselves, without the help of those who have been there before can be a PAINFUL experience.

As I look at my crooked toe every day, I am reminded that I should have asked for help. How many of us need and want help, but try to keep doing it on our own? I do think that much of life would be less painful if we just ask others for help. There are many who have been there before and maybe we could ask them, before we hurt ourselves. Now the next time you see  me, I know you are going to want to see my crooked toe. I need to warn you... that I am a little self conscience about it, so I probably won't show it to you! Then again I have so many other issues on this poor body of mine, I guess my toe should be the consider the least of them. :)

I hope you have a wonderful night and try to remember it is important to hang on when you get to the end of your rope, but also you can yell for HELP too!

"A bend in the road is not the end of the road... unless you fail to make the turn."  ~Author Unknown

"When the Japanese mend broken objects, they aggrandize the damage by filling the cracks with gold.  They believe that when something's suffered damage and has a history it becomes more beautiful." 

~Barbara Bloom

Maybe I should have a golden toe then? Heck, I should have my whole body made of GOLD! :)

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