Ben is Going to Be the Death of Me...

Another Ben story...

On our walk tonight, Ben found a tennis ball. This summer, Jack taught him what tennis balls are good for so we went to the nearest church parking lot for a game of dog'n'ball. I tossed and he chased for a good 20 minutes. Now here's where the death part comes in.

A group of kids and parents began exiting from the church, and knowing that Ben loves nothing more than to bust like a whirling dervish into the middle of a group if kids, I quickly snapped on his leash. Ben was thoroughly distracted from the ball by now, so I walked over to pick it up. Now, in my defense, the parking lot was dark, the ball was old and gray and blended perfectly with the poorly-lit asphalt. I bent over to pick up what I thought was the ball, but my hand connected with a leaf and, calamitously, my foot connected with the ball--quite resoundingly, as it turns out. The ball trumped the kids (on the one hand something running and bouncing, on the other, something merely screaming--if you were Ben?). Ben broke off and gave chase like a stooping falcon.

I knew that I couldn't let go of the leash, I knew it was going to hurt when he ran out of leash, and I wasn't sure the leash could take it, so I stared running after him. I just didn't account adequately for his remarkably superior speed. When he came to the end of his leash, I was already in motion. One arm was straight out attached to the leash, the other left behind by the force of my forward momentum, and the speed of my churning legs woefully inadequate when I went airborne.

Airborne is OK, landing is problematic. My nose and front teeth have been here before so, when they realized they were first and second choice for landing gear, they quickly dodged to the left and the landing was a teeth jarring, graceless, brain-numbing thunk on my startled right cheek bone.

All the way home my cheekbone reminded me that landing on asphalt is not in its contract. It's still reminding me.