The Many Thoughts of Wanda Kidd

I just want to say that I am a pretty “good faller”.  When I was about six, we remodeled our house on Oak Avenue into a split level with two full flights of stairs. It became clear early on that I was prone to falling either up or down those stairs on a regular basis.  

At first my daddy would run to see if I was hurt. But it happened so often, that I began to shout out upon landing, that I was Ok. Then someone would respond from wherever they  were in the house , “Are you sure?” I would then take inventory and confirm my condition.

While I never broke a bone, several trips to the ER were necessary for stitches. Once, when I was six, I placed four glass Long Meadow Dairy milk bottles at the top of the steps heading into the kitchen. My unsuccessful plan was to keep our new kitten hemmed in on the porch.  I am not sure why no one moved the bottles to the spot where our milkman Mr. Cheek could pick them the next morning, but they lingered there throughout the day and we stepped over them as we prepared to cook out on that hot August evening.  When mama asked me to carry the Bar- B-Q utensils into the kitchen and put them in the sink, I exuberantly ran to do her bidding, only to trip on the second step and fling myself upward.  The motion broke one of the bottles and lacerated my right wrist. My memory is like a GoPro video from that point.  I was picked up, jostled to the sink, felt water running over the cut, heard mama telling my brother to get a washcloth, being carried to the car, stopping by Dr. Hooker’s office next to Senter’s Drug story, having him tell my mom to take me straight on to the ER in Chapel Hill. Then it all kind of gets blurring, until my daddy opened the curtain in the cubicle where they were putting in 136 stitches into my little arm.

Daddy was working out of town that summer and he only came home on Fridays. But for some reason of which I was never clear, he came home that Wednesday evening to surprise us and he was definitely surprised. He found the backdoor open, a broken milk bottle on the steps and a path of blood from the steps to the sink and back to where the car had been parked.  He called his mom to ask if she knew where we were and when she said no, he headed for the ER.  I know that because when he came into the room with me with a mask on his face, I asked him how he found me.  He told me that story and then I said, “But how did you find me? He said, “I just came to the desk at the emergency room and asked if Wanda Hardee had been admitted?”  I said, “Why did you think it was me?” To which he cocked his head with laughter in his eyes, as if to say, “Who else would it be?”

There is a marked difference between the philosophy of throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks and actually being willing to risk the fall.  One is an exercise in experimentation and the other is a commitment to living into the experience. There is a place for both approaches, but the one that actually changes me in a profound way is the one when I am willing to put myself at risk rather than avoid the experience all together

The trick to being a “good faller” is to relax and roll with it.  People who panic and brace themselves when they sense that they are failing are more prone to be hurt by the experience. I realize that embracing the fall is not a typical approach, but if I feared the fall, there are so many things I would never have done.  I am not now and never have been an athlete.  I do not have good balance, or extraordinary strength. But within reason, I am not afraid of the fall.  

The willingness to fall has provided me with the space to risk  without being overwhelmed by a fear of failure. And within that willingness to fall has come some great stories.

I have been a children’s, youth and college minister, for as long as I can remember and helping young people to see themselves as beloved children of God regardless of the falls they take has been the overarching goal of my ministry.  To help a child understand that to forget their lines in a church program, is endearing rather than humiliating has been a mantra of grace. To encourage one of my youth to risk rejection when working with a wary stranger on a mission trip. That is where the growth happens for both the youth and the stranger and has been the goal of each journey. In addition, it is important to provide the space for a young adult to lead out in something they have never tried before and watch them see themselves with new eyes just because they tried. All of those approaches have been the reason that I have continued to lean into those places in people’s lives with my own willingness to fall and not see myself as a failure. I cannot ask others to take a risk,  if I am not willing to personally chance the fall and model that it did not make me a failure.

Whoever put out into the universe the idea that perfection is the goal of living has missed the whole purpose of living and has crippled several generations of human beings. The need for perfection is paralyzing.  It cuts us off from ourselves and each other and in so doing separates us from God.  Our need for perfection and our fear of failure is an idolatry of self. 

There is a chasm of truth between, “If you are going to do it do it well, ” and “Don’t do it if you can’t do it right.”  One is a goal, one is a roadblock.  So many of the interactions I have had with youth and young adults through my life have been to help them reframe the barriers that keep them from thriving.  Often the conversation included phrases and questions like, “Here is another way to think about that” or “What is the worst that could happen and if it does, then what do you do?” It is the permission to fall without seeing themselves as a failure.

In our quest to make sure that our children are safe and happy, we have confused falling with failing. We have turned “risk aversion” into a place where their God-given callings have been thwarted by our own fear. The Christian gospel is fraught with risk, but we gladhand that message with our own version of the gospel that gives us a false sense of peace and cuts our children off from the fullness of God’s creativeness. Our children have been entrusted and shared with us, not given to us to stifle and extinguish the Christ light in them.

It is past time that we give ourselves permission to see ourselves for who we really are and love ourselves anyway. We are beloved children of God who have been given the space and grace to fall.  We are people who can laugh at ourselves, so that we do not fear others laughing at us. We are people who can risk something new, knowing that we will not get it right the first time, but  can use what we learned to do it better next time. We are people who can embrace our shortcomings and offer grace to others because we are not hiding our true selves behind a façade that cuts us off from each other.

Last weekend I went bike riding with two people who know me well and love me anyway. We drove over to a greenway in a neighboring town, where no one knew me. The space was shared by both bikers and walkers. I have never been a great biker, but that did not stop me from getting on a bike whose brakes needed oiling and was too tall for me safely to get on and off.  I was heading down the path before I realized I should have probably checked the brakes, by that time I was headed to a turn in the trail that had a sharp turn right by the river. I was bombarded by all of the things that I had misjudged  and I felt myself panic and begin to swerve. Knowing I was going to crash, I leaned into a lifetime of preparation and just embraced it. I relaxed and hit the ground with a roll and at the same time announced that I was fine and I really was. I got up by myself and continued on. My companions assured me that I could stop and they would not think less of me, but I wanted to continue.  I will admit that I was a little more aware of the possibilities of failure and began to notice when the path came closer to the river, where the drop off was steeper or that there were other people on the path that I could  veer into. So after two more unfortunate encounters with the ground, one of my co-riders contained his laughter enough to say, “You know Wanda, if you look up and ahead rather than at the possibilities of danger, you would do better.”  I  mentioned that advice would have been appreciated a couple of miles back, but it did change the experience.  I began to see the surroundings and then saw the path very differently. I made it back to the truck without another fall and a deep sense of accomplishment.

There is a great difference between falling and failing and there is God given grace for those willing to risk and embrace the reality.  Moreover, when we allow ourselves the freedom to lean into that truth, we can offer it to others who are willing to take the risk as well. Thanks be to God.