Fallen

I have fallen a few times in my lifetime, but one occasion remains engraved in my mind.

Years ago, I was in my senior year in secondary school. I was a popular kid in school back then. Everyone knew me. The majority of the teachers loved me. For most of them, I was their favorite student. I was intelligent, usually top of my class and quiet. Perhaps that's why they loved me.

As popular as I was, most of the students saw me as someone who had no business with sports. They saw me as a weak, pampered kid who didn't have what it took to engage in sporting activities. I didn't blame them for feeling that way. I never really engaged in any sports activity for the majority of my time at school.

One day, the school announced her sports week. It is a whole week set aside for competitive sporting activities for the students. Parents were also invited to attend. In the usual fashion, the students were divided into groups called houses.

Each house was characterized and named with a color. So there was the yellow house, green house, blue house, and Red house. I was assigned to the yellow house. Coincidentally, my crush was not only a member of the house, she was made the leader. Her name is Jane. She was a class ahead of me. She was one of the prettiest girls in school back then.

We had our first meeting as a house to decide who would represent yellow house in the various sports.

"Who would like to represent us in the long jump category?" Jane asked.

"I'll do it" said a kid from the back, raising his hands to show his excitement.

I sat there watching as she called out different categories of sports and people expressing their desire to represent.

For the first time, I eagerly wanted to participate. I wanted to show everyone that I can do sports and, of course, I wanted to impress her.

"Who would like to represent us in the race category?" she asked out loud.

"I will" I said, raising my hand.

Everyone turned to face me on hearing me say those words. The shock in their faces was palpable. Jane seemed even more shocked. Suddenly there were whispers all over the place.

"Are you sure you can do it?" she asked, just to be sure I meant what I said.

"Yes, I can do it" I replied.

"Okay then. Victor will represent us in the race category", she said to everyone present.

The competition began. Each house competed in the various sports to win medals. The red house led on the medals table. They had more gold medals, their athletes were really good. My house, yellow house, was third in the standings, we had just 3 good medals and several bronze medals. We were eager for more good medals.

The time came for the race. I was all kitted up. My good friend, Daniel, was still skeptical about my ability to participate.

"So you really want to do this? Are you sure about this?" Daniel asked.

"Yes, I'm sure. Don't worry, I'll surprise you all" I replied.

Word had spread so fast around the school that I was participating in the racing category. Everyone wanted to come and see for themselves. The staff, the students, and even the principal wanted to come and witness me run.

The athletes for the various houses stepped forward to the starting line. We all got on our knees waiting for the "go" signal. At that moment, I became so nervous. I also had a rush of adrenaline. It was my first time participating in such a thing, and I wasn't sure how I would fare.

Suddenly, the bell rang to signify the start of the race and all the athletes took off. As we ran, I noticed everyone was running past me. Within seconds, I was way behind, trying to keep up with others. Then my heart began pumping so hard. It came with massive exhaustion and I hadn't even completed half of the race. I decided to push myself further, and I threw my legs further and higher as I ran, hoping to cover more ground. At some point, I felt as if I was flying.

Source

All of a sudden, I threw my legs in an awkward way and as I was in the air, I knew I was about to fall. I fell to the floor, and I knew I had messed up. I felt like the ground should open up and swallow me because the shame would be great.

"How was I going to face everyone?" I wondered to myself.

I managed to stand up and complete the race, coming last in the process. All eyes were on me. Some had looks of concern for me, others had looks of mockery.

I was totally devastated, but Jane walked to me and said

"Don't beat yourself up, Victor. I'm glad you participated. I'm proud of you"

Those words cheered me up a little. I walked home that day, a battered boy.

I never thought I would recover from that humiliation, but two weeks later, it was all water under the bridge. It was like everyone forgot about the incident and people barely brought it up. Occasionally, I would joke about it with my friends, and we would all laugh.