'tarded, more 'tarded, and the most 'tarded yet!

Yes, "'tarded" as in REtarded. If you are offended by the nomenclature, then tell me about it in the comments section and bugger right off my blog. Quite frankly, my opinion of the humorless Thought Police is just about as low as the maggots holding the White House hostage. Both are just embarrassing those of us overseas who actually have to 'fess up to being American. Of the same ilk, I say.

So, tard, tard, tard, tard, tard.

Whew. Glad that little PMS missive is over. Now on with the post...

I've never been athletic. Or graceful. Or coordinated. Chewing gum and walking at the same time took me years to master. Don't laugh. I'm not in the mood. Bad PMS. Read the above missive if you don't believe me.

Seriously, though, I was very young when I had to deal with the cold, hard reality of this...uhhh... inability. As hard as I tried, I was never even able to master the monkey bars. I tried. The good Lord knoweth how very hard I tried. I couldn't even do just one. I could hang for a second, maybe two. That was about it. My mom would carry me down the line, holding the bulk of my weight, so I could make attempt after feeble attempt. When I failed, she would say, "It's okay. You are just not athletic."

It was an anthem repeated often throughout my childhood. I started out in gymnastics, but I couldn't do the forward roll properly. The teacher wanted us to roll onto our feet, but I could never get myself there. I always rolled forward, and stayed, on my butt. The rest of the class progressed to backward rolls and I was still plugging away at the forward roll. Eventually, the teacher let me try the backward roll with disastrous results. I was like a damn Weeble, man. I just couldn't get myself to roll over. I'd roll backwards, get stuck on my shoulders with my legs straight up in the air, kicking wildly trying to get some momentum, and then roll forward back to the starting position. Okay. So I was like a weeble with legs, standing on my head. Maybe I wasn't Weeble like at all. But I think you get the picture.

By this point in the class, the rest of the kids had mastered the cartwheel and were doing round offs. The teacher decided to forget about the rolls and set me apart to do donkey kicks. I did donkey kicks twice a week for an hour. That's all I would do was donkey kicks. I would daydream of becoming the Nadia Comaneci of donkey kicks. Bringing home a hard won gold medal in the newly introduced Donkey Kick event. I can still do a mean ass donkey kick (but, even if a million bucks were on the line, I couldn't muster a forward roll -- and I've never really attempted a cartwheel).

As the class came to a close, and all the other children were progressing to the next level, my teacher suggested my mom enroll me in ballet class. Out of gymnastics and into ballet, complete with pink itchy tutu. My stint with ballet left no lingering memories with me (except for the aforementioned itchy tutu) as it was brief. That teacher soon suggested my mom enroll me in tap dance lessons. This I loved. Those shoes were just the shiznit! And the shuffle step of tap dance became my new donkey kick. I was shuffle stepping like a champ. Sadly, the rest of the class was doing a routine that required a riff, ripple and the cramp roll, none of which I could do.

From tap I went to ice skating. And then to tennis. Oh, and swimming lessons. How could I forget spending three summers as a Minnow at the Portage Park swimming camp? How I longed to be a Bluegill, but to do that one had to pass the test. The test! Most of the kids passed the test within the first couple of days. It wasn't that hard, and I had no real fear of water. In fact, I loved the water. But to pass the test, you had to hold on to the wall, put your whole face in the water, blow bubbles AND kick your legs all at the same time. Yeah. About three too many things to be doing at once, if you ask me.

Over the years I tried my hand at biking, bowling, rollerskating, skiing, cheerleading, jazz dance, tennis one more time to make sure I really did suck at it (I did), darts (is that even a sport?), golf, and skee ball (at Chuckie Cheese, primarily). At the ripe old age of 35, I can confidently and without a shred of doubt tell you that I am indeed NOT athletic. Mom was right.

And yet, I have hope for my children. I don't want to put undo pressure on them. But I so hope they take after their varsity letterman father in the athletics department. In that spirit, I enrolled Roman in gymnastics and Reilly Kate in Tball. They're doing... ummm... okay.

I mean, Reilly Kate loves Tball. She's even attempting to hit the ball. And she runs. Damn, that girl can run. She flew to first and rounded to second and then ran right passed second, half way through the outfield. We were all calling for her to come back, but she thought we were all just cheering her on. Oh, and she's got the cutest little stance. Look at it! If nothing else, she looks good on the field. That cap. The jersey. Even the glove that is two sizes too big (borrowed from a friend because Mommy is such a 'tard I didn't even think to buy her a glove). The whole outfit just works. As a feminist, I am proud my daughter is taking advantage of the opportunity to even play Tball. It's the one sport I didn't fail at because I never had the chance. As a walking fashion faux pas, I'm proud my daughter can pull off a baseball outfit and look together. Is that wrong?

But Roman. Gymnastics. Honestly, he does really well. He does. Part of my problem with the class is that it is "Mommy & Me" which means that Mommy does half the work. I have flashbacks to my own tumbling history and it isn't pretty. It's hard for him to focus on the skills being taught if Mommy is following the coach around trying to grasp the concept of a straddle roll or regaling her with the glories of my own donkey kicks. Yes, the coach even commented on my very nice donkey kicks, thankyouverymuch. So he doesn't focus. Instead he takes volleyballs out of the ball bin and aims them at the little girls in the class. He throws himself on the mats while other kids are doing forward rolls. He shoves his way onto the trampoline and won't let the other kids on. He puts himself in time outs just so he can sit and look at himself in the mirrored walls. Roman does as Roman wants in gymnastics.

Today, in fact, he decided he'd had enough and asked to leave shortly after the class began. So, I put our shoes on, packed us up, and marched us out the door. I'm not going to stay in a gymnastics class longer than I have to. Not at my age and athletic ability. No sooner had we walked out the door than Roman took off at break neck speed racing toward the street. I thought, "Lord, just stop him before he gets run over by a car." And then. He tripped. And fell. Face first. Head bouncing off the pavement. Not exactly what I would have done to stop him, but then again, I'm not God. And it worked. Who am I to question?

We went back into the building and spent the rest of gymnastics class sitting with ice on his head. I'm not sure if he is going to go back to gymnastics or not. Perhaps I'll sign him up for ballet. He would probably like the tutu more than I did.

But it was the bike ride this afternoon that really was the inspiration for the title to this blog post. To fully appreciate the situation, we have to go back two and a half years, to Reilly Kate's second birthday. Mama and Daddy gave her a shiny red tricycle. She loved that trike and I was excited to get her on it and outside riding down the street, enjoying the fresh Hawaiian air. And then I discovered she couldn't steer. No, my dear, darling two year old could NOT steer. Not at all. We worked feverishly on the steering, day after day, sweaty, sweltering, blistering hot Hawaiian afternoon after horrid Hawaiian afternoon. It sucked. We'd see the other moms and kids traversing the neighborhood without a care in the world as we just went round and round (verbally as well as literally) with the steering.

She's never quite mastered it. Four years old and she still just cannot do the steering. Forget steering and pedalling at the same time. That is an impossibility. It's me all over again, only worse. Much, much worse. I was good at the trike. Or at least my memory of me on my trike is good. Last year my mom bought her a big girl bike. I'm not sure why we did such a thing since a bigger bike only means bigger problems. But we did. Besides, Roman needed to get himself on that trike. And, let me tell you, that kid is good at it. He can steer that baby left and right and backwards and forwards and all over town. He's hot on those wheels, baby.

And so, it was with Reilly Kate on her big girl bike and Roman on the tricycle that we ventured out to the playground in our apartment complex. Oh, and to complicate matters, we brought Truman -- the incredibly unlikeable wiener dog. Of course, Reilly Kate cannot actually ride her bike to the playground so she was walking it. Which was also impossible because, well, she'd have to walk and push her bike at the same time and that cannot happen. We're still working on walking and talking here. So we aren't even out the elevator when she is in hysterics, tripping all over herself, and dropping the bike. Roman, is happily riding down the ramp backwards, way ahead of us. Truman is weaving in and out of my legs so that I either trip over him or stomp on him and break his back. I tripped over him. I didn't want that vet bill.

And there we were. The cute little family. Me trying not to squash the dog while helping Reilly Kate steer her bike as she attempted to walk and push at the same time with Roman riding the trike backwards. It was as some Korean middle school students were gawking and giggling at us that I heard a voice in my head say, "'tarded, more 'tarded, and the most 'tarded yet!"

It was probably God talking to me. I'm sure he's mad at me for being ungrateful after he prevented Roman from getting hit by a car by bouncing his head off the pavement. As penance I'm going to go do 100 donkey kicks and give Reilly Kate's bike to charity. Then I'm giving up on all things athletic. We'll turn our attention toward music. Have I ever told you how unmusically inclined I am? I went from piano, to recorder, to flute, to guitar, to handbells...