The same thing happens each year. My theatre friends try to goad me into auditioning for a musical. I remind them I can’t sing or dance. The show passes by, only for the same cycle to repeat six months or so later.
If I had only brought a video camera with me to the York Ice Arena last weekend, I might have convinced them for good that I don’t have the grace for that kind of performance.
I headed over to that facility to cover an arena football game for the York Daily Record. I love getting to experience new things and had never covered the indoor variety of the sport.
As is my custom, I checked out the concession stand at halftime. The visiting team from Harrisburg had taken a huge lead so I pretty much knew how my story would go at that point. Why not enjoy a soft pretzel?
That didn’t cause me any problems, but the action after my snack did. I went to go throw away my trash, making my way across the bleachers to the nearest trash can. As I stepped overtop one row of stands to the next one down, something happened.
I don’t know whether my ankle rolled – I have sprained each one pretty badly in the past – or I just lost my balance due to clumsiness, but I knew pretty quickly I had a situation on my hands. I had my work bag in one hand, the plate from the pretzel in the other and not much room to stumble gracefully.
Somehow, I managed to do a 180 as I tried my hardest to avoid simply falling on top of the people in front of me and had nowhere to go except straight down. So I prepared to keep my head up as I planted my body on the concrete floor.
One thing went wrong, however. As I landed, I felt a pop in my shoulder. Any athlete knows that feeling a pop never amounts to anything good. Any thought of being embarrassed quickly went out of my head as I worried about whether I had seriously injured myself on my way to throw away a paper plate.
Whatever popped out popped right back in as I worked my way to my feet. The folks around me checked to make sure I was OK – I commend them for not giggling at any point during this – and I made my way to the trash can. I spent the rest of the night covering the game and stretching my shoulder just to make sure I hadn’t done some serious damage.
I have visited the doctor and don’t think anything major happened. I don’t have any more soreness at this point than I would after a day of over-exertion. I never had the best flexibility in the first place so I don’t have to deal with that getting any worse.
In the end, I just have another story about doing something clumsy in the course of my regular activities. I have said many times before that I have accepted the fate of being here to amuse others with my mistakes.
I just have no intention of doing that on stage in a musical. i have my pride after all.