Surviving

I always wait until the very end of the designated month to renew my vehicle registration. “Always wait until the end of the month,” my grandfather said, “in case you total your car during the month.” I follow his advice. That means my annual trek to the former post office building is usually rushed and occasionally a little late.

When I enter, I always glance up to left and right, hoping that the old WPA murals that once hugged the ceiling have magically reappeared. I see the whitewash. I sigh. I return to my truck for my forgotten proof of insurance, mumbling something slightly unedifying under my breath. I write my check for dozens of dollars and get the little plastic sticker in return. I sigh.

No matter how hurried, I always exit that building with care. The steps to the sidewalk are steep and treacherous. I know. I’ve been skittish of them for years. I hold fast to the rail, remembering the unplanned roll I took from top to bottom when I was a lad.

I don’t know what caused me to stumble.  I suspect it was running or jumping or doing something I shouldn’t have been doing. I was bruised and bloody when I hit bottom, but I survived. Nothing broke. My only broken bone (yet; knocking firmly on my wood-composition desktop) came a few years later as a result of my Absolute Last–I vowed a vow–attempt to climb a tree.

Family lore was once chock-full of stories of my mishaps. There was the time I wiggled out of the highchair at Wyatt’s Cafeteria in Longview (no memory), and the time I dove headfirst-diaper-and-all into one of those old-fashioned deep bathtubs (no memory) and the time I busted my lip by falling against a glass display case at Fedway in, yet again, Longview (vague memory, but just what did now-defunct Longview establishments have against me?). I never hear those stories any more. The grown-ups who used to embarrass me by hashing and rehashing the stories of my childhood indiscretions–the list is much more extensive than I’ve confessed here–are no longer around to tell the tales. What would I give to blush one more time?

If nothing else, evidence indicates that my head is indeed hard. Or maybe a little cracked. Or perhaps both at the same time.