Off the Cuff / My Other Journal

Don’t Chase Your Hat!

The lesson is: Don’t chase your hat especially when it lands in the middle of a highway.

“Trucker Hit by SUV While Chasing Hat”
“Monday, August 13, 2007 4:42 PM EDT
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP)

This happened when the trucker stopped to secure a load he was carrying. The news says, “A gust of wind blew off the brown baseball cap that he had worn for years. The cap landed in the median.”

Luckily, the trucker is alive except for a broken wrist and a dislocated shoulder.

This bit of news got my attention, for I am known for chasing after things floating about with the wind either in the real or the metaphoric sense. I could definitely chase after my Writing.com hat, come what may.

When I was six years old, I almost fell down from a third story balcony, chasing after a floating balloon that sailed out of the window. Someone grabbed me in half nelson and pulled me inside the house. This caused my mother to faint, which was quite commonplace since my mother fainted at the drop of a hat (forgive the pun).

On the other hand, I made her faint quite a few times, because “chasing after the wind” with speed and maneuverability has been a skill I was born with. Now in this age, because I have lost some of the speed, I am trying to master the last minute face-offs with the wind.

And the wind is catching on to me and it is the one chasing me. Depression No: 4 in the Atlantic is one proof of that, and it is making me crankier, forcing my chasing skills to the forefront, as I imagine myself running after our roof flying in the wind.

Still, maybe I won’t chase after the roof in the wind, but the roof better not sail away with my WC hat.

Okay, okay! I am allowed to get silly. It is the age or the wind, you might say.