Life In Balance

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When I was a kid my mom found a balance beam that my oldest sister could use to practice gymnastic type things. I don’t know how long that thing sat in our front yard, but I remember it being wooden, blue, about one foot off the ground, and maybe ten feet long.

As little brothers do, I would watch my sisters and their friends go back and forth across the thing. I’m sure every time I wanted to try they would tell me to wait my turn and send me back to the porch steps where I’d sit in a harrumph, elbows on knees, chin on fists. Then they’d eventually saunter off to walk around the neighborhood and act like they didn’t notice the boys they had gone looking for.

That was my chance.

I don’t know what girls think when they walk across a balance beam but it probably has something to do self-awareness and perfection. Little boys, or at least me, pretend that once you get on the balance beam the ground turns into lava and if you misstep you’ll fall into a hot, melty death. Even a toe tap could dissolve one or two toes. For the record, living room carpets and sidewalk cracks were also known to double as fiery graves. Hey, you gotta do something to make commercials and shopping trips bearable.

So there I was, attempting to walk across that blue beam in my L.A. Gear hightops, careful to also avoid any incoming sniper fire from the neighbor’s roof. Most everyone can relate to that feeling of trying to walk on that kind of obstacle, maybe even a street curb, and the feeling of starting to wobble as you lose balance. I used to react in a few different ways when I started to lose it.