Our 18th adventure took place six weeks ago, way back on December 5th.... I know. I'm way late on getting this blog post written and published, and I hate to admit that I can no longer recount many of the details of the day. I blame it on the time of year, the craziness of the holidays, etc etc, but enough with the excuses! I'll just share with you what I remember...
Our outing started off with a bit of a disappointment as multiple Femmes did not show up at our meeting place, without expressing prior regrets. Turns out they thought our adventure was planned for another day and were unable to join us (again, I blame the frenzy of the time of year). So we ended up with a smaller than normal group, as we made our way to Sky Zone in Shawnee. Yep, we went trampolining!!! (is that a word??)
Jumping on trampolines. Sounds easy enough. I expected this to be a relatively thoughtless, effortless and straightforward activity. Boy, was I wrong! Within the first five minutes of jumping, several of us had already taken a seat on the sideline to catch our breath and were baffled by how out of shape we appeared to be from doing such an "easy" activity. After ten minutes or so of just jumping around freestyle, we headed over to the foam pit, where you are supposed to bounce yourself off of a trampoline and into a large pool of foam blocks.
Alli took right off and immediately jumped in, making it look like a piece of cake. Jessi and Meagan soon followed, and then I believe Amy made it in as well. This left Lisa and I, who had to get over our disgust with the idea of jumping into this cesspool of strangers' sweat and who knows what else. Once we convinced ourselves we could, in fact, walk away without acquiring a communicable disease, we took our turns. However, this did not go off as easily as you are probably imagining in your mind. There is an exact science to successfully jumping into the foam pit that no one cared to share with us. As a result, rather than looking like "Tigger" springing easily and carefree through the air, we both landed hard, on our hands and knees, on the edge of the platform (between the trampoline and the foam pit) and then awkwardly rolled/fell into the sea of germs. After that initial disgrace, I did make one successful jump, while Lisa had had her fill.
Alli was definitely the daredevil of the group and was doing front flip after front flip into the pit. I shuddered every time as I was POSITIVE she was going to break her neck. After one final close call, Jessi declared it was time to move on.
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| Foam pit highs... |
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| ...and lows |
Next up were the basketball goals where we had a little shoot-out amongst ourselves, and where everyone was able to complete a slam dunk (sort of). As far as actually making the ball in the goal... that didn't always happen, but we did all have a chance to hang on the goal, making us feel like real superstars. Again, I was the last to complete this task. As the tallest member of the group that day, you'd think I should have had an advantage at this, but that neck breaking fear was still there and was really stifling me. Every time I bounced underneath the goal in preparation to attempt my dunk, all I could visualize was my head hitting the rim, jamming my skull down, while my body continued to travel upward and my cervical spine buckling upon itself and breaking into a million little pieces. I'm not lying. I am generally not an anxious person, but this adventure caused a flare up of anxieties inside me I never even knew I had. I was disappointed and dumbstruck by my fear... but, eventually I was able to do it.
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| WNBA potential!?! |
We finished up our time back at the open court area where we jumped around some more. Alli and Jessi, both former cheerleaders, were doing all kinds of fancy jumps and tricks... I was exhausted just looking at them. Lisa, Meagan and Amy joined in and I suddenly felt like I was severely misplaced at Cheer Camp. Apparently, I'm the only one that is too inflexible to do a toe-touch or a "Herkie" (a term I had never heard before), so I stuck to my own specialty... lateral jumps off the sidewalls.
Like any adventure, there were varying degrees of success and pleasure. Unfortunately for me, this was one of my least favorite adventures because of the disproportionate fear, the self-consciousness and the inability I felt. It was eye-opening though to see some of the others having a great time while I was miserable. It reminded me that we all have different strengths and weaknesses; different opinions and enjoyments; different struggles, and different victories. It doesn't matter who's the best, or the fastest, or the strongest, for we will all have highs and lows along the way. What matters is that we all try.
"Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure." - George Woodberry
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| Amy |
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| Alli |
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| Meagan |
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| Jessi |
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| Lisa |
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| Destiny |
