My Era

When you've done something for most of your life, it's a strange feeling when it suddenly comes to an end.  The second I tore my Achilles, my tumbling days were officially over.  

I first started gymnastics when I was nine years old.  Typical story...lots of energy, needed an outlet, local gym, etc., etc.  Growing up, I competed all-around...floor, rings, vault, parallel bars, high bar and pommel horse.  My pommel horse and high bar was a joke, parallel bars and rings were okay, and vault was good.  My strength, however, was definitely the floor, learning backflips and tumbling.  I loved it.  Sure there was a lot of technique, body mechanics and muscle memory involved, but mostly....Dan run and jump! It just made sense to me.  Plus, I always thought it was the coolest part of gymnastics...doing flips.  Growing up as a gymnast, it's easy to take some crap, but the minute you bust out a backflip....that's cool.  As I got older and stopped competing, my skills on the other events fell away, but my tumbling...that stayed with me.  

Tumbling is a skill that not a lot of people can do, and I've taken advantage of that.  I've done backflips to get a job at a bar while I was in college.  I made money flipping on a trampoline for an advertisement for a paper company.  When I was teaching, I'd bust out a flip to make sure my students were paying attention.  When I started working for the Celtics this year, my "thing" was that I was the one who did the flips.  Tumbling was just as fun now as it was when I was first learning how to do it.  It let me show off a little, it set me apart...it made me special. 

I used to jokingly say that I'd continue tumbling as long as my body would let me.  Unfortunately, my body has sent me a message, loud and clear that it's time to stop, and I need to listen.  My flipping days are officially over.  Sure, after I tore a bunch of ligaments in my knee, I said I was officially done tumbling then.  But...after reconstructive surgery, I started healing and eventually got back to it and tumbled better than before.  But...that was also eleven years ago.  I'm pushing thirty now.  While I would love to be able to throw a flip and tumble like I used to, it's now too much of a risk.  The impact this injury, surgery and recovery is having on my life is too great.  It's time for me to be done.  

Knowing that I'll never do a back flip again is weird.  It has been part of my life for so long.  I don't remember learning how to do it, or the times I crashed attempting new skills...I just remember being able to tumble.  Dan run and jump.  

Now, part of me is pissed off that an injury is forcing my "retirement".  I would much rather end on my own terms, stop when I feel it's time.  In reality though, I don't think that day would have ever come.  I don't see myself ever just choosing to give up on something that has been a part of me for so long.  In a way I guess I needed the injury to end it for me...something to pull the plug.   

I guess now it's time to move on.  Time to find something else to set me apart, something else that makes me special.  The beginning of a new era.  

In health and with respect...

D