A Fall

The other day, while walking home from Prospect Park, striding along briskly and feeling like Superman, I stumbled. My momentum was so great that I pitched forward and staggered for a couple of steps, trying to right myself, before landing on my face, hands, and knees near two workmen seated on a bench eating their lunch. They grabbed me under the arms, pulled me up, and set me down on another bench. Alarmed by my bleeding, they asked if they should call an ambulance. I declined the offer with thanks and, after sitting a few moments to collect myself, slowly walked the rest of the way home.

We were expecting guests that night for dinner, including a friend whom we hadn’t seen in about twenty years and in whose honor I had gotten a haircut that morning so that I would look my best. When she saw me, though, she was horrified by my appearance. “Oh, it’s nothing, really,” I told her, “just a fall,” but during dinner, after I began to sweat profusely and to feel dizzy and nauseous, everyone at the table insisted I go to an emergency room.

An MRI of my head showed no internal bleeding, fortunately, but I was told to expect headaches for several days. Just before I left the ER, the nurse told me she would sum up the three-page report of my condition. “It says, ‘don't do it again.’”

That morning I had walked fast in Prospect Park, enjoying the shade of the great trees and catching glimpses of dogs catching frisbies on the Long Meadow, but I guess that’s all over now. At 78 I finally have to be more careful. The elderly Clark Kent has been forced to walk cautiously and to look out for obstacles in his course instead of admiring the trees and flowers all around him. Superman’s been grounded for good.