Falling Up

I fell on Monday morning. Down like driving rain, down like baseball sized hail, down like sledgehammer blows. Walking on my parents' driveway, I turned to look back at something in the garage. I felt my right ankle give way and saw myself crumple.

My left knee took a pretty bad beating, but I can't feel it (don't have much feeling left from my kneecap to the middle of my shin after a rollerblading injury 15 years ago). The rest of my physical self was shaken up but okay. My psyche took the hardest blow.

How did this happen? Yesterday I was a young mother, falling down the stairs holding my infant son, marveling at the instincts that allowed me to protect him even while I was bumping down an entire flight. He didn't even wake up, and that was all that mattered.

Today I'm . . .shall we say. . . mature. . . enough that I just don't bounce the way I used to. The thing is, I still want to fall.

I want to fall in love again.

I want to fall under the spell of poetry that's new to me.

I want to fall for bad lines and good jokes.

I want to fall into bed, exhausted at the end of long, fruitful days.

I want to fall into bed with no thought of sleeping.

I still want to fall.