A Big Brown Day

Did you ever have a Big Brown Day? The 2008 Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner and this year's hopeful to break the 30 year drought on the Triple Crown, Big Brown seems to have had a bad day on Saturday, during the Belmont Stakes. It seemed like the other races at first. His jockey let the others break out and we kept expecting him, Big Brown, to come from behind and run away from the pack. But the break never happened. After the race, the buzz was there must have been something horribly wrong with the horse. So far, it seems that the horse is fine. Now we sit and wonder, what happened? Did he just not feel like running that day? Did he just have a bad day, on the worst possible day in his 3 year old life? He had never lost a major race before. We have all had those days. So much is expected of us for whatever our goal is and for some reason, it just doesn't happen. Mine was in high school. I was on the swimming and diving team and it was my senior year. I received my letter jacket as a sophomore, not because I earned it, but because my coach awarded it to me. It was still special to me, but I wanted a chance to earn it. The day of the Regional swim meet in my senior year was the last opportunity to place in the top six and earn the jacket on my own. I had placed 7th in the previous years. I felt ready. I was performing well, consistent and even though my region was the toughest in the state(the number one girl was an Olympic alternate the next year and the number 2 girl now does commentary for the Olympics), I thought I could do it. Unfortunately, I had an off day that day. Dives I could normally do with no problem at all were suddenly hard for me to do. And the hard dives were even worse. Once again, I placed 7th. Sometimes it isn't meant to be. We all have to search for the deeper meaning in the trial and error than in the achievement of the goal. Life is a journey and not a destination, that sort of thing. It took me a long time to find that meaning and embrace it. Hopefully, Big Brown's family will someday reach the same conclusion. Of course, we don't have to live out our Big Brown days in front of millions of people with so much money and pressure "riding" on our backs. Thank goodness!