Greg Bales

In Which the Manner of My Death is Foreseen

I cannot complain about the fact that today, Iowa City temperatures reached 40ºF for the first time in months, but I can complain about the fact that it still gets cold enough at night for the snowmelt to freeze into thin sheets of banana-peel-slick ice. Twice this week I have fallen. My first fall happened a mile away from the house while I was walking Newton. I was just descending a rather steep hill when I stepped on an ice patch and went flying. Bruised my left arm and hip. Newton kept walking until he found something he could eat; then he waited until I got up and met him. I was actually talking to Jeremy P—— when it happened, and of course my phone hung up on him. When I called him back he said, “Oh, you actually fell?”

The second fall happened tonight, just outside the back door, when I was taking out the recycling. It was a similar slip: one step and down I went. Bruised my hand and cut my finger.

Both falls went unseen, which is kind of a shame. What good is a fall when no one is around to help—or to laugh?