Erynn and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day(s)

Just over a week ago, Erynn had a very very good day. She has been taking ballroom dance as an after-school class this year, and has therefore been dancing with the Dixon Middle School ballroom dancers at various concerts this year. Last week, the two Dixon teams went to a competition involving several local middle schools. Long story short, Dixon walked away with two gold ribbons and the trophy for overall best dancers. Erynn was justifiably happy and proud. I was originally planning to write a blog complaining about how everything needs to be made into a competition in our society. But I figured since my daughter's team won, I'd let it slide.

HA! In your face, Other Local Middle Schools!

Anyway, she's had a good week. And then, yesterday, the Dixon team had one dance at a Provo High School dance concert. As I found out later, Erynn (as she says), "biffed it" as she was walking into the school just before the concert. Scraped and bruised both knees and both elbows. Must have been quite a biff. It included a face plant, so that her upper lip came between her braces and the sidewalk, resulting in blood and puffiness.

Trooper that she is, she bandaged up and got ready to dance. And dance she did. We didn't know any of this, sitting in the audience, videotaping our daughter's one performance, which as near as we could tell went well. However, if you examined closely the videotape, you would be able to find, as we did later, the exact moment when her dress fell off, and she was scooting to the back of the stage in her black undies, there in front of God and everybody.



As spectators, we honestly didn't notice it at the time. I'm not sure if anyone did, really. Except, of course, Erynn and her fellow sufferers up on stage. But it's there, on tape. It brought a smile to our faces last night as we watched it. In fact, it brought loud guffaws and snorts of laughter. Erynn wasn't convinced it was that funny.

She managed to get her dress fixed in the intervening 15 seconds or so, while the dancers were in two lines (her in the back, thankfully enough), doing hand jives. And the rest of the dance went off without any major wardrobe malfunctions.

As if that wasn't bad enough, the luck continued to today, which, of course, is Mother's Day. Erynn spent her last package of -- well, it's some kind of crafty plaster-like substance -- in making a pretty heart-shaped present for her Mom. And when she was working on it, she picked it up to move it and it broke. Likely beyond redemption.

Sad indeed. But the saddest thing is what she said to me last night, as we contemplated the dance debacle. She said, "Well, I guess it was just getting back at me for being so happy last week." If you're not quite sure what "it" was, then you probably haven't spent your life convinced that "it" was keeping score, and trying not to be too obviously happy or worry-free, because you knew beyond doubt that "it" would pay you back if you were. I have spent my life that way, so I recognized the symptoms immediately. It's part of my family heritage. I got it from my dad, who gotit from his mom, and on back, somewhere into Denmark, which gave us, after all, Hamlet, and goodness knows he knew better than to get too happy. I'm not sure, but I think "it" lives somewhere near Copenhagen.


Anyway, I have a few words of advice to give my daughter: You don't have to be another dismal Dane. First, you have every right to be happy when good things happen. Second, nobody is keeping score but you. Third, if you don't believe what I just told you, then start right now to fight that feeling. Fight it for all you're worth. It might be too late for me, but you can still save yourself.