I am not one to back down from a fight. I like to look my opponent square in the eye and take them on.  I love trash talk.  I love match play, mano y mano.  I love competition in general.  Life is a competition.  I have tried to suppress this tendency, to be kinder, gentler.  I grew up in a zero-sum-game household.  There had to be a loser to have a winner.  All of your successes were relative. We were awarded trophies and ribbons based on merit and they were prominently displayed in our family’s den.  We were all about winning.

Rick and I hike.  It’s what we do. It’s what we build our vacations around.  Some of our favorite places are Zermatt, Switzerland, the Lake District of England and the Santa Lucia mountains near Carmel.  All of these places are mountainous, which can be tricky for me because I’m scared of heights.  Over time, the fear started to beat me.  I would get to a certain narrow spot on the trail and despite all of Rick’s encouragement and cajoling, I would turn around, forcing him to either abandon the hike or go on without me. This was not tolerable.  This could not happen.  I would not lose to an irrational fear. 

So, when faced with a challenge that I can’t conquer, I enlist help. Houston does many things well.  One of these things is that we churn out gymnasts.  Bela Karolyi  lives here, for goodness sake.  It was an interesting couple of days on the phone trying to find an instructor willing to take me on.   My mission, to walk on a balance beam.  I found Sean, an Olympic hopeful now teaching cheerleaders to do back flips. He only returned my call because he thought I had a daughter who wanted to take gymnastics.  It took several months to work up to it.  Me and the preschoolers (their moms and grandparents watching through the glass wall) tore it up every Monday morning at 10:30.  I started out on the floor, then worked on a beam sitting on the floor, then a beam six inches off the floor, then a beam with giant mats underneath.  Then, voila, I mounted the beam, walked forward, walked backwards, did turns, fell off, climbed back on, all without a net.  Take that.