Horseshoes and Hand Grenades

DeSean Jackson of the Philadelphia Eagles made a boneheaded play last night. I didn't see it but I heard much ado about it today and saw the video. He had the football, was running to the end zone and, just before crossing the goal line, he let the ball go in a celebratory spike of sorts. Then proceeded to do his "touchdown dance."

The problem -- it wasn't a touchdown. He let go before he crossed the line. He was close, but you know what they say: Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

As we get older (yep, here comes Robyn with her newfound "I'm 40 now" wisdom), we tend not to act so prematurely. We sort of have that "I'll believe it when I see it -- but not a moment before" attitude. Probably because in our lifetimes, we've gotten burned too many times. We celebrated too early -- or perhaps got upset too early -- before something came to a conclusion.

In our house, we certainly know we can't count on a Vikings win just because they're leading by 15 points (grrr). We know on the golf course we can't count a birdie or par (or bogey for me) until we see the ball go in the hole. Carter knows he can't win a football game if his team doesn't score. Oh but it was a close game!

Sometimes close just isn't good enough.

I can't come close to meeting a deadline at work and expect my superiors to be happy about it.

I can't make a cake with close to all the ingredients and expect a tasty delight (trust me, you can't skip the baking soda).

I can't expect to come close to losing weight if I keep eating Hershey's Kisses (have you tried the new Candy Corn ones?) and don't exercise. Close will not help that zipper go up on my "skinny black jeans"!

It's probably a good thing for a lot of us that life isn't always addressed in absolutes. Sometimes we can be close and that's good enough. In fact sometimes, like when I snuggle with Carter at night and I can feel his breath on my cheek as he falls asleep, I'd say close is pretty darn good.