Prove Nothing

We're bikers. Well, in a hand-me-down mountain bike with a trailer attached kind of way. Still, we go on family bike rides several times a week and look forward to each one. Well, the other day Rob told me to follow him up this little mountain, and once at the top, laughed and said we were going down (this wasn't a laugh of jest, but pure adrenalin). I looked at the steep dips marked by ATV tracks and hesitated, while Rob charged down the slope with my kids in the trailer!!! Well now what! "I can't" has been deemed a "bad word" in our house since we've started trying Robbie out in the deep end and without training wheels, so I had no choice. I'd barely gone two feet, when my bike slips from under me, sending me skidding down the mountain--rocks tearing holes in my clothes and skin. I curled in a ball, unable to stop the tears.

"Are you serious?" I hear Rob say as if he is completely dumbfounded that someone could fall off the ridiculously dangerous hill. I look up and start laughing and crying at the same time; the boys are totally confused.

I ride home in stinging pain (I have so much more sympathy for my kids with scrapes now--I've forgotten!)--everyone staring at the girl who looks half-dipped in chalky paint.

The picture does no justice. My body is scabbed from ankle to bicep and there is a gash/bruise four inches around on my hip. Needless to say, I'm trusting my instincts next time and proving nothing to anyone.