Life in the Balance

Sometimes I think I worry my family too much with all of the fun, crazy things that I do. I would say that I worry my friends, but they're usually right with me when I am doing them. At least my family can't be surprised at my exciting tales: I've been encouraged to be independent and adventurous since the early days of my youth when I was climbing trees taller than our house and diving into a flood ravaged Blue River because it looked like fun. But, I wanted to take at least one post to let them know that I am not always off doing extreme things. Nature strives for a balance, and so do I. Even though I enjoy some pretty crazy adventures on the weekends, during the week, for the most part, I try to play it safe.

For example, Sunday night after a good full weekend of adventure, I took a shower, put on clean clothes, and cooked a roast with carrots and potatoes, using pot holders to protect my hands and making sure that the meat was fully cooked to kill any potentially harmful bacteria. I spent the remainder of the evening watching movies and afterwards, I said my prayers and tucked myself into bed, making sure to lock the front door to keep out any potential bad guys that could have been lurking around the neighborhood. On Monday morning, I woke up with the sun and had a breakfast complete with cereal, orange juice and a banana to start me off to a healthy week. I brushed and flossed my teeth, and then headed out to work. I waited for the light to change green before biking across Curry Road, and even looked both ways before I crossed. At the lab, I used nitrile gloves while handling neurotoxins, and even washed my hands afterwards to be on the safe side. I used caution when I was working with heavy metals and viruses, but wiped down my bench with alcohol anyways to ensure that I wasn't spreading the stuff all over the lab. I helped out my labmates when they needed a hand, and got everything done that I needed to accomplish in a safe, efficient manner. I even resisted the tempation to retaliate against Pierre after he sneakily shot me with a pair of latex gloves from across the bench (age old habit in our lab). In the afternoon, I stayed awake during an entire seminar lecture and then packed up for home after a successful, risk-free day. I was doing really well, having managed almost 24 hours without doing anything that would scare my family. And then, on the bike ride home, I couldn't contain myself. Ryan sped by me in his new Mustang and stopped at the light at Curry Road, idling just a few hundred meters in front of me. We often race home, but normally we start as soon as we walk out of LSE and I always win by a pretty substantial margin. The temptation to race home from only a mile from the house was too much for me, so I shifted into my highest gear and crunched the pedals up the hill to the intersection. I passed Ryan while the walk sign across Curry was still solid white, dodged a few cars through the intersection (I did look before I did this), and pumped as hard as I could towards home. I could hear Ryan's engine coming up behind me, so I made a quick left across Miller to duck onto the back roads to try and cut him off before he could get past the elementary school. We met just as we arrived at the school from opposite directions, and both of us looked at each other with competitive smiles as he zipped past me. Although his engine could obviously beat the two pistons of my quads any day, I still had the advantage of not having to slow down around the last two sharps curves before the driveway. We raced the last few hundred feet with me cutting corners and jumping curbs all the way to the house. Ryan pulled ahead down the long straight stretch of Susan Lane, jumping out of the car just before I panted up to the sidewalk, congratulating him for the first time since we started our silly game.

I'm afraid that speed and adrenaline are just far too addictive for me to deny, and that I can't say no when given the opportunity to participate in something that gets my heart pumping and puts a smile on my face. I'll just have to keep reassuring my family that I am careful and I do think about my actions when I go out and do these things, and that I try to balance the extremes in my life with normal, safe activities as well. I keep saying my prayers and thanking God for giving me a pretty hardcore guardian angel that has been able to keep up with me as I speed around this swiflty tilting planet, and I know that at home in the midwest, my family is doing the same.