Rolling the hard 6

She put a gun in my face.
And cocked it?
Yeah.
You've come back from worse.
(Scene between these two)

Several friends, to me: Hey, why don't you stay off that ankle for a while longer?

I do everything the hard way. People who know me well know this about me, occasionally nudge me about it, and then back off. Because they know I am not going to listen.

When I was a kid we went on a lot of nature walks, and I remember the park rangers telling us we had a choice back up the mountain - the ranger way or the candy way.

The ranger way, obviously, was straight up the steep slope. The candy way was a gentler, probably safer, traverse. Either way you'd get to the same place. I'm not sure that rule holds as true in life. I think when you take the ranger way, you end up someplace different.

The ranger way has its drawbacks. It's lonely. It can be scary. The park has a spooky element to it around midnight. You don't want to stop.

But if you don't take these risks, you miss out on the low-hanging mist with its visible edges. You miss out on the loud crickets and the solo horn player and the figures appearing suddenly, vaguely threatening shadows, coming out of the trees and onto the road.

I could sit home. I could watch endless TV and eat too many snacks and pine for the right company. I could ice my ankle and stay off it and risk nothing.

No, I couldn't. I really couldn't.