Klutzy Jennifer

I am a klutz. I think if there were some contest of Mrs. Klutz of America ... I would hold the title. As I'm sure you realize by now, whenever I have a revelation like this that there is a story to tell. I can't begin to tell you all of my klutzy stories, but here are a few prime examples.

When I was in high school, I was in the color guard. One time at band camp (yeah yeah) I tossed my rifle. It was such a beautiful toss until it cracked me upside my glasses and broke the frame. I was often tripping and falling or twisting my ankle. Once we had these huge backdrops on the field. It was a double header show day. We were performing in one city and then getting on the bus to go to a second show. Well during the first show, I had walked back behind the backdrop to switch out from flag to rifle (or flag to sabre or flag to something) and I slipped. The ground was wet from the rain we had earlier in the day. As soon as I slipped, I knew I had twisted my ankle. I wound up standing behind the backdrop the remainder of the show. I wound up not being able to perform the 2nd show.

My first day of college classes, I sat up in my bed. For other people, this is a common thing that wouldn't cause injury. Not for me. For you see, I failed to remember that I was not in my bed at home. I was on the bottom bunk of a bunk bed. Therefore, I sat up in my bed and hit my head. After I thought "Ow that really hurt," I got dressed and went to class. I hadn't been sitting in class long when a fellow that turned out to be a really good friend for the remaining 4.5 years of college informed me that my head was bleeding. Not only was I a klutz in private, someone had seen the evidence of such klutziness 30 minutes after said klutz moment occurred.

It was about a year and a half later I was walking from class to my work place. I worked in the college campus bookstore and often went straight from class to work. This particular day was quite memorable as it was my birthday. I also had a major project due this day in the class I would go to after I finished working at the bookstore. Instead of leaving my project in my room, I decided to bring it with me to work so that I could go straight from work to class. So I was on my way to work when all the sudden I fell. Now there was a good reason I fell.

That particular day it snowed. There was a patch of ice on the sidewalk which caused me to slip. Considering I had a back pack on and I was carrying my project, I simply wasn't prepared to balance myself well when I slipped. This caused me to fall flat on my knees. This fall caused my pants to rip, my knee to bleed, my project to get soaked and me to be horribly embarrassed since there were several others around me at the time. As opposed to being late to work and since I was only a few feet from the doorway, I went ahead into work. I still have a scar on my knee from that fall. I don't remember what grade I made on that project, but I do remember being embarrassed turning in such a disaster of a project.

A few months (maybe even further than that) back, I was working out on the Wii. While I was in the cool down mode for one of the runs, I walked to the kitchen to get a drink of water. I managed to trip over a bag of garbage and almost hurt myself, but I managed to not spill the water.

Now that brings us to last night. Picture this: Laundry is in the washing machine ready to be pulled out. I go and open up the top and start pulling out the wet clothes. Hmmmm something is stuck. I can't get it out. So I pull and pull. I reposition myself and yank. Then it happens. Klutzy Jennifer strikes again. While I was pulling my wet clothes (or not pulling as the case was), I jerked my hand/arm out of the washer and hit myself in the face. Yes, my lip started swelling. Yes, I used ice. Good news is by the morning, the swelling had gone down.

Ugh. The Klutz Strikes again.