.png)
Some
people fall asleep. Others fall in love. I just fall.
 |
| Georgiana Sook Class of 2019 |
Frequently,
like it’s a favorite hobby or a trend I’m trying to start.
“First
day with your new legs?” is a question I got asked a lot growing up.
Sometimes
there’s ice or uneven pavement to blame, but usually it’s just me losing my
balance unexpectedly or tripping over my average-sized flat feet. I always
manage to land on my pride.
Silly-shaped
bruises decorate my pale skin like temporary tattoos— gravity’s way of
reminding me to keep things colorful and quit taking myself so seriously.
In the
past year, I have fallen down three sets of staircases and up one.
I have to
say, I never fully understood the value of carpeted stairs until I fell down
wooden ones. Traipsing down the staircase at 2am, trying not to wake slumbering
housemates, and then it happens— I miss a step. As if to make up for the one I
missed, my body comes into full contact with every remaining stair, crashing
into a heap of twisted limbs and erupting into pained laughter at the bottom.
The last
time I fell was after giving blood. Now you must understand— I’m a champion
blood-giver. I am embarrassed to admit I take some sort of weird pride in
being able to watch when the needle gets put in and not cringe. I can usually
fill the bag in under 5 minutes. Sometimes, however, pride comes before a
(literal) fall, and such was the case that day. Ever optimistic about my own
capability, I hopped up from the table when the woman gave me the go-ahead,
disregarding her warnings, confident the two baby cinnamon rolls from my dear
roommate would sustain me. I recall bending down to pick up my water bottle,
and the next thing I remember is waking up 10 feet away to concerned, hovering
faces. I immediately tried to sit up, an attempt that was met with a chorus of
adamant commands to stop and lie back down. I obeyed, not wanting to anger the
hovering faces. The man informed me that he had to check for a concussion and I
laughed, assuring him that I was fine and that falling was nothing new for me.
“You fell like an angel,” he said, and I smiled awkwardly at his cheesy attempt
to be consoling, mostly because the only fallen angel I knew about was Satan.
A few cold rags and a bag of Chips Ahoy later, I recovered.
Since
being at college I have slipped on ice patches, wiped out in my residence
hall’s parking lot, fallen in the shower, and slid down the muddy bank of a
walking trail. I have accepted falling as an inevitable part of my existence,
and I have become better at it with practice. The following is what I’ve
learned about how to fall.
This is
how you fall:
You fall
like you mean it with every part of you.
You fall like your body has been dreaming of
what it’d be like to see the ground again.
You fall
in front of others who will laugh at you, and you laugh with them. You learn
that your tears look best dressed in laughter anyway.
You fall attempting to do the ridiculous, the
impossible, the things they told you you couldn’t.
Because
maybe you need the perspective you can only get from the ground—the reminder
that all the beautiful growing things start from the dirt.
Maybe
your body needs a rest from its daily strain against gravity.
Maybe you
need to look up and realize that the world is far bigger than your little
problems that seem all-consuming.
Maybe you
need to see the stars and realize that sometimes they fall too.
Maybe you
just need to understand that once you’ve hit the bottom, the ground will
be there to hold you up.
(Even
after all you’ve ever done is walk all over it.)
Fall
down and be surprised by the hand that reaches out to help you up.
Fall
apart and let someone squeeze the pieces of you back together.
Fall
short and be humbled when you see who cares enough to make up the
distance.
Fall,
get back up, and fall again.
Fall
until you’re not scared to climb.
Fall and
let your scrapes be the proof that you’re fragile—let the blood remind you that
everyday that you wake up, you’ve been given the insane privilege of being
alive.
Fall and
let your scars sing the stories of what it felt like to fly.
This is
how you fall.
Georgiana Sook is a freshman McConnell Scholar studying political science at the University of Louisville.