Keep Moving

Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.   

...Albert Einstein

image via stock photo/bicycle

And if you fall you must find the courage
to mount it once again
and continue on your way.


When I was quite young, around seven, every Saturday night my brother and I would saddle our horses and ride from our house to the rodeo arena at the fair grounds to participate in "The Riding Club".  It would take us about an hour.  My brother, being almost six years older, took very good care of me on those rides. 

One afternoon late, possibly a little behind schedule, my brother ask me if I wanted to gallop.  We were crossing an open field and I thought it would be great fun.  He said, "let's go" as he spurred his horse.  My horse, caught off guard, leapt to followed just as we happened upon an unseen drainage ditch.  She jump it leaving me somewhere behind.  I landed with a big thud, flat on my back, knocking the breath out of me.  I was too dazed to cry.

My brother, out of concern or the fear of being in trouble, coaxed me back on the horse with the promise he would not leave my side, and that we would walk the rest of the way.
When we arrived I rode around the arena a few times, dismounted handed my dad the reins and walked away.  I don't remember how my horse got home.  I am guessing one of my brother's friends or my Dad rode her home.  

Everyone told me I had to get right back on.  They said the longer I waited the harder it would be to conquer my fear.  Everyone had stories of falls and tumbles.  I heard the whispers of the Mommas and Daddies as I sat quietly in the bleachers with Momma.  Everyone was concerned, but my Dad.  He never pushed me to mount another horse.  He, instead, waited patiently.

One day when I returned home there was a book about a girl learning to ride horses laying on my bed.  I read it cover to cover before going to bed.  The next day and the day after I read it again.  I read that book daily for weeks.  I missed the horses and riding.

Gradually, I made my way back to the barn and back onto a horse.  Waiting probably did make it harder.  I rode again at "The Riding Club".  I barrel raced in high school rodeos and traveled to many places to participate in many rodeos.  I won, I came in second and third, sometimes I went home empty handed and I was thrown off again more than once.

I had learned my lesson young.  You cannot allow fear to stop you from doing what you want to do.

Friday, after my accident with the deer, someone offered to drive my car.  I immediately declined and said I needed to drive.  Somewhere in my heart I knew if I handed over the keys, I might not pick them up again.  I would be lying to you if I said I do not think about the accident and what might have been each morning when I get into my rental car to drive to school.  The dreams are becoming less vivid and the horrible sound of the poor animal hitting my car is quietening.  The "what ifs" are fading to the background, being replaced with gratitudes.  Bicycles, horses, cars...life all have the ability to send us flying and to the ground.  It is what we do when we get up that directs us on our way.    

Let's keep moving!