I really respect in gymnastics, when an athlete has fallen off the balance beam, or hit the high bar with their feet, or when a person lands squarely on their ass during a floor routine, that they get back on, back up, and pick up where they left off or even start over.

Where else does this happen? You’ve just lost. You have no hope. You’ve shamed yourself and your country and ruined this moment and years of training but, hey, you should do it again. That must be so hard. To get back up and jump around, swing around. I want to see them cry and run away. Hell, that’s what I would do. I would swear and spit and smash things and then I would cry and run away. It must be so very hard to start over, to continue, to keep the barest shred of your dignity.

I can’t think of any other thing like it. You’re fired, we’re not going to pay you, but we still want you to work here. Well, I can think of one thing like it. American Idol. You lost and you’re not coming back and we don’t think you’ve got what it takes but would you mind singing us through the credits? But this is much harder, much bigger, much worse.

Life might be better if it were like that. Instead of swearing and cursing god, or running away crying, that we get to do it again. That we’re expected to do it again. High school math exams. Your first driving test. Your senior high school prom. Losing your virginity. A job interview. Hell, even tripping over a sidewalk.

Have you ever seen this? When people, most people, trip over a sidewalk, they make an angry face and look back at the offending space of sidewalk. As if they were blaming the sidewalk. It always amuses me to watch people trip and turn around and blame the ground.

SS