I have been so clumsy. My jeans are bootcuts that are nearly flares, and I keep getting the toe of one shoe snagged in the flare of the other pant leg. I go right down hard on my hands and knees, or else I manage to fling out my arms in time to catch a railing and hit my chin on it. There’s no saving this kind of tripping, it is only about limiting the damage. One day I will trip while carrying a baby, and I will finally have an answer to my frettings about what if that happened. In the hopes of not finding out, I walk bowlegged like a cowboy whenever I’m carrying anyone else, and I hold the baby in what I think of as a “crash position”: held so that I could continue to hold on to the baby with one arm even if I had to catch us with the other arm. These are the same jeans I wore pre-pregnancy, and I did not trip on them then.

A few days ago I ran into a door. I was glad I didn’t need medical attention: imagine trying to explain to a doctor that no, seriously, I ran into a door, REALLY, my husband wasn’t even home. When I’d heard that excuse used by battered women in movies, I’d always wondered why they used that one–because, how do you run into a door? Here’s how: you open a spring-hinged wood-trimmed screen door confidently, swinging it hard open so you can dart through before it slams behind you; you accidentally get your other foot in the way of the door’s opening, so the door bounces off that foot and slams back into your face as your face precedes your body through it. My ear was neon pink and had a huge white welt on it. The pain made me realize I would never be a boxer or even a casual street fighter. I sent up a thankful thought to whoever it was who made it so I have to have c-sections and will never experience labor unless there is a terrible blizzard and I am snowed in and have to deliver my baby myself onto a plastic garbage bag covered in the set of sheets that got caught in the hinges of the hope chest when they were nearly new and so even though they’re ripped I can’t stand to throw them out because they are otherwise perfect.