Misadventures of Rebecca Cannon

What is so funny about watching me fall?! Is it because it happens so often? Or is it the funny sounds I make as I am hitting the ground? Or is it the look of sheer terror on my face as I (yet again) hit the ground? It’s probably the moment just after I fall when I’m sputtering, crying, laughing, screaming, scrambling to regain my composure and hollering at my husband that it isn’t funny. Okay, maybe it’s all of that. Whatever it is, I’ve given my dear, oh-so-sympathetic (NOT!) husband lots to laugh over lately. If you haven’t figured it out by now I fall down often and it seems to have gotten worse with time in Costa Rica. I personally blame it on the fact that none of the surfaces here are level or predictable and the fact that my mind is so full of new words and sayings that I just can’t concentrate.

Just today, don’t ask me how, I fell stepping off the curb in front of our house. I let out some kind of death cry as I hit the street – at least something made a noise, maybe it wasn’t me because it did sound sort of “beastly.” I managed to land only on my left knee, which is now very purple and swollen and hurts to bend. I was actually pushing Brooklyn’s stroller at the moment and so the stroller (with Brooklyn in it) went flying across the street. (Don’t panic, we live on a very quiet dead-end street so there wasn’t traffic) Sean, while doubling over with laughter was trying to figure out if he should run for the stroller or help me up. He chose the stroller (major daddy points but lacking in the caring husband department) and left me to roll in misery in the gutter. The man working outside of his house down the street stopped to stare at the pathetic Gringa wallowing in the wet gutter. Somehow I even managed to scrape the top of my toes. How did I scrape the top of my toes?!

I mentioned in a previous blog that I was nearly swept out to sea at the beach. I suppose I should be more honest. Actually, I was knocked over by an unexpected wave, tossed around a bit and came up sputtering with a rather unsavory mixture of sand and salt water in my mouth and nose. All this while Sean looked on in amusement. He was kneeling, watching me flail around in about 2 feet of water as though I was drowning -and I thought that I was drowning, how was I to know that if I just stood up I’d be fine? Okay, this actually happened three times in the hour or so that we were at the beach. Have I mentioned that I'm actually very afraid of the ocean and that I was concerned that Brooklyn really would get hurt? Yeah, that probably isn't much of a defense on my part, is it? So, I suppose I'll admit it. I'm a klutz. That's about it. Just pray that Brooklyn doesn't inherit my grace.