Preknowings: Success Always Fails (PUBLISHED ON AMAZON)

Training

        We were led into a big gym. Trampolines, rope swings, monkey bars, balance beams, a foam cube pit, and much more gymnastics equipment. "Wow!" Pauline exclaimed, "Am I dreaming?" She asked in a dazed voice. "No," I said, quite surprised myself. Rosenbaum cut in, "Before each obstacle, there should be a sign on the floor near the equipment. It gives you a challenge you must complete on that obstacle." And with a triple blink at us, Rosenbaum left. Pauline and I moved to the first obstacle. Monkey bars, I thought, this will be easy. Pauline read the challenge out loud, "It says 'On every other bar, hang upside down from your legs, then grab the next bar and let go with your legs, and so on until you finish.'" "Sheesh," I exclaimed, "We're not supposed to be training for an acrobatic performance, right?" But Pauline wasn't listening. She was already halfway done with the challenge! I hurried up the ladder to catch up. On the second bar, my legs slipped and I fell flat on my back on the hard floor below. I tried again and fell from the fourth bar. After a few more tries, I finally made it.

         The next obstacle was a rope hanging from the ceiling. The challenge was to climb to the top and press the red button on the ceiling. Pauline had already completed it five minutes ago. After getting over halfway up, my leg started to burn slightly. Probably the rope, I thought. I looked down to touch it, and froze. The distance between me and the airbag below seemed to stretch until it felt like I was looking down from the top of a skyscraper. The vertigo was overwhelming. I looked back up. Dazed, I reached down to gently feel the rope burn on my leg. I realized that I was slowly leaning backwards. Quickly, I leaned forward again. The long rope swayed. Shakily, I scampered up the rest of the rope, pressed the button- it buzzed- and anxiously scooted back down and landed on my feet on the airbag.

         The next obstacle was the foam cube pit. There was a diving board installed on the edge. The challenge was to do a flip off the diving board into the sea of foam. This would be easy. I do flips into pools all the time. I quickly finished that one, but, Pauline only had one more obstacle to go. My next obstacle was a trampoline. It was huge and extremely bouncy. For the challenge, I had to do two flips on it. The first time, I almost broke my neck, the second time I twisted my ankle, but the third and fourth times I made it. Only three more obstacles to go.