Word Vomit You Can Use

Cady Heron, Lindsey Lohan's character in "Mean Girls," had a habit of blurting out things, even though she knew nobody wanted to hear the words.  She called it "word vomit," which was her term for uncontrollable utterances.

I know about word vomit--because I sometimes say things that I swear I can't control.  For example, when I'm in the street and see two adults on bikes with a child, invariably the child is wearing a helmit, but the adults are riding without.  It drives me crazy.  What's the child supposed to do when his/her parent suffers a traumatic brain injury?  What kind of example is that parent setting?  I always say something--I can't help it.

Fortunately I live by my beliefs.

Yesterday I decided to enjoy the early summer weather with a bike ride along the lake.  The weather was beautiful--and I actually enjoyed being out . . . until I encountered a couple of slow moving bikers.  Not wanting pass them by moving out into traffic, I decided to move to the sidewalk and pass on the inside.  Not a very good plan, but seemed somehow safer to me.  Bad idea.

Making a hard right turn onto a slightly raised driveway proved disasterous.  My bike went down and I flew over the handle bars right onto . . . grass.  That was lucky.  I did hit my head, hard.  And I hit my shoulder (even harder).  Of course about 100 people saw my crash, and all but two of them spared me their direct sympathy.   I was too embarrassed at the moment to listen.

"Are you alright?" asked the two bikers I was trying to avoid in the first place?

"Yeah, I'm fine."  I smiled back.  Relieved, they rode on.

But I wasn't fine.  My head had just bounced off the ground, and my shoulder . . . God, I hope it wasn't broken.  That would suck big time.

I was near the end of my ride--and my bike was undamaged.  I carefully pedaled the rest of the way home without incident.  I had not suffered a concussion--my balance was normal.  No ears ringing.  No pain.  I did have an abrasion on my forehead from the helmet, but no blood.  That would have been ugly, especially since I was reading in church for Pentecost Sunday in an hour.

And, I was less and less worried about the shoulder, too.  I had full range of motion.  Pain, but no swelling.  Bruised, yes.  Battered, definitely.  Broken, no.

Church went fine.  My wife and I were readers who were part of the mult-language babble to illustrate the miracle of Pentecost Sunday.  I read German.  Clarisa read Spanish.  And I did it without drooling, suffering from a splitting headache, and with clear vision.

You see, I was wearing a properly fitted biking helmet earlier in the day.  And, even though I bumped my head hard from falling, my brain was uninjured.  Thank God!

Talk about a Pentecost miracle!

As God is my Witness . . .

Yeah, it's a great moment in the greatest movie of all times.  Scarlett O'Hara, looking at the ruins of Tara--utters the famous words, "As God is my witness.  They're not going to lick me  I'm going to live through this.  And when it's over, I'll never be hungry again."

I uttered nearly the same words the first time I was fired from a job. The experience was devastating.  At the time, my career choices were limited.  I lacked skills and experience that could easily transfer to new employment.  But, I had a family to feed and it was up to me to bring home the bacon.  So, thanks to good advice and a supportive spouse, I dragged my aging butt back to school, earned a law degree from a top-five law school, passed the bar, and, voila, amazing options opened.  It took long hours, hard work, lots of prayers for patience, and financial hardship.  But, like Scarlett O'Hara, I discovered the path to security required hard work, sacrifice, and a compromise or two along the way.

What kind of compromises you might wonder?  Nothing that would ever land me in jail.  However, I've been a few places on this journey I never expected, all in the name of making a living.  Maybe someday I'll dish--but the blog will be anonymous or told by the Lucky Lawyer.   What I can say here is this:  I was not in the room when the pepper spray was blasted. But, I did see the stripper with man hands.  She was remarkably pretty.

As God is my witness . . . .

Now that I've had my Scarlett O'Hara moment, I'm barreling down on a Kim Wayans moments.  Like in one of those In Living Color skits where she spewed out EXACTLY what was on her mind, all in the name of "keeping it real."  I'm in the mood to tell off somebody who has done me wrong. 

I wonder if I could curse and swear at the guy and say I've come down with a temporary case of Tourettes.  Or maybe, I'll just look him in the eye and say what I think.

I haven't been this disappointed with a professional colleague in a long time.  And, he needs to hear what I think about what he did.  We've been planning to meet for beers after work for weeks--it's my mission to see that this meeting happens.

As God is my witness . . .  this man has some explaining to do.