What is your most embarrassing moment?

If you had to narrow it down to just one, of the possibly hundreds of times you’ve been left red-faced or ashamed, what would you choose as the most monumental?

Thing is, it’s not always a simple, clear-cut answer. Perhaps you were about to respond with something you once thought was the worst case scenario only to realize that what was embarrassing say twenty years ago is not something that would even be on anyone’s radar today. Often our perspective changes.

People being people, we usually manage to stumble into something even more embarrassing before what we thought was truly embarrassing even has time to become a thing. Sometimes we just reach an age where we realize it was never as embarrassing as all that to begin with.

For example, there once was a time when it was considered embarrassing if your underwear showed above your waistline. Then one day, it just became a fashion statement. Personally, I’d prefer it went back to being embarrassing. I’m so over droopy drawers and butt cracks!

There was also a time when it was embarrassing if your child grew up to be different and unique. Thank goodness we’ve grown beyond that and we now embrace and encourage individual expression.

I’ve personally experienced so many embarrassing moments that I don’t think I even truly remember half of them anymore.

For example, could my most embarrassing moment possibly be the time I accidently walked into the wrong high school classroom, sat down, made myself comfortable only to be told I didn’t belong there?

Not particularly. That was, admittedly, slightly uncomfortable, especially during those few moments . . . that seemed to drag out forever . . . when I had to stand up, gather my things together and slink back out the door. It wasn’t a happy  moment but it certainly wasn’t anything I was dwelling on a week later.

Was it the time, in fifth grade, when I jumped on top of two boys who were fighting because I thought one of them was my brother and I was willing to defend him regardless of risk of injury, not even thinking about the fact that it would have probably been highly embarrassing for him to be rescued by his sister?

Both stopped fighting, as much in shock over the fact that some crazy nutcase was now involved in their tussle as I was to realize that neither of them was someone I knew. I tried to casually extricate myself from the fray and back away from the staring eyes. Still, my attempt to simply melt into the crowd was not entirely successful.

I spent the rest of that day, worried about running into either one, concerned about what I would do if people started talking about the incident whenever I walked into a room. Yet, I must confess, it was by no means the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to me. In fact, it’s more funny than embarrassing, looking back on it all these years later.

So then, was the most embarrassing moment the time I ran over an entire flock of chickens?

Before you demand I be drawn and quartered, I did not do it on purpose. I tried to avoid them. They just seemed to have a death wish and committed poultrycide en-masse.

Now that I’ve piqued your curiosity, this is the true and honest story.

I was travelling on a rural road one day, when I spotted a flock of chickens toddling down the gravel shoulder. I thought that the closer I got to them, the more likely it was they’d scatter, head into the ditch or at least stay where they were. Still I slowed down to pass them. It was at this moment that they decided to move as one unit in front of my car.

Perhaps they thought, as a group, they were certainly a bigger force than the metal beast that was threatening their territory. I can’t say for certain. I have no idea what goes through the mind of chickens.

I tried to brake but, by that point, I was on top of them.

Then all I can remember is that there were chickens in the air and feathers everywhere. One moment I’d been driving casually down the road, enjoying the scenery and bopping to some tunes, the next–chicken carnage.

I felt bad for the poor birds and was very embarrassed, imagining what the farmer had probably thought if he’d had the misfortunate to witness the whole incident as it unfolded. I kept my head down for days, waiting for someone to holler: “Hey, chicken killer. I seen what you did the other day on Concession Road so-and-so.”

But, nope that was not the most embarrassing moment of my life.

More embarrassing than that was the time I was working as a news editor and I wrote a story about the police doing breath tests along the canals to discourage boaters from drunk driving. Only problem is, thanks to Spellcheck, my whole article took on a different vibe when the word ‘breath’ got changed to ‘breast’, with each and every incidence it was used. And thanks to a perpetual lack of sleep on production nights, I was too dimwitted to catch the error before the whole mess went to press.

The police called my publisher to let him know about the error, jokingly stating that several of them had volunteered to be assigned to that particular area for the summer. The publisher, subsequently, came into my office and tossed a copy of the story in front of me and asked if I noticed any problems with it. I began reading it and my stomach fell as I hit that first ‘breast’. Horrified and dismayed, I was certain I was about to be fired. I wanted to crawl into a hole.

In the end, I didn’t get fired. My boss laughed heartily after he let me sweat it out for a few minutes. I was mortified but he seemed to find the whole thing to be utterly hilarious. I even won a turkey trophy for it, one of two I now proudly display.

Second trophy was for a headline that got cut off. Coincidentally, it was for another story that involved the police. Was supposed to indicate they’d be keeping motorists safe with new planned initiatives but the word ‘safe’ got dropped off, so it instead indicated they were ‘keeping motorists’. Not sure what they were going to do with them but they were apparently collecting ’em.

I’m hoping it had nothing to do with the breast tests.

Anyways, those were admittedly epic embarrassing moments but, nope, still not my personal best.

My most embarrassing moment, the one I’ve never forgotten, the one that stands out even to this day, is one that occurred when I was very young, indeed.

I was probably in grade one or two; and, I felt as though the world had come to an end, on the day this happened. I was certain that there was no point to going on.

Okay, so I was a tad dramatic. It wasn’t as bad as all that. It just felt like it to the shy, introverted child I once was.

It all began a long time ago, on a playground, during recess.

The bell rang gloriously to mark break time and we all ran outside to get first dibs on the swings and slides. I got into the line for the monkey bars. For some reason, there was a line at each end and we’d cross at the same time, meeting somewhere in the middle. Maybe so more people could get a chance to cross in the limited time allotted. In any case, getting past one another, successfully, was all part of the fun.

I was happily making my way across when the kid coming from the opposite direction suddenly fell. Problem was, when they went down, they reached for the only thing they could grab, which happened to be my legs. As they slid towards the ground, so did my pants … and my underwear.

Now whether or not they came down as far as I recall is open to debate. It’s been a long time and I was very young. Like many things from childhood, the memories of the event may be slightly exaggerated. My reaction, however, was instantaneous.

I let go of those bars and dropped to the ground faster than a stone sinks to the bottom of a lake. Then I stayed crouched down until I could hastily pull everything back into place. With that accomplished, I beat a hasty retreat, finding some corner to hide in so no one could point and say: “See that girl. Yeah, she’s ‘that one’, the kid who mooned the entire school from the monkey bars.”

The fallout was minimal. I think the whole thing happened so quickly that no one, other than the ones nearest to me, even seen it.

In my mind, though, it was front page news. It was going to be the message of the next PA announcement. Everyone would know about it. Everyone would be talking about it for years to come. I’d never live down the shame. I’d have to quit school.

So, there you go. My most embarrassing moment, the one I most wish had never happened, is the day I lost my pants on the school playground.

Now that we’ve cleared the air, it about time I let that go and moved on to find me a new most embarrassing moment. I still have a good number of years left to make a blunder so astronomical, so marvellous that people will be talking about it long after I’m dead.

Weird thing is where that thought would have once gutted me or left me wanting to bury myself deep beneath the sand, today I’d most likely be laughing right alongside everyone else. Because to me, my most embarrassing moments are often just hilarious.

Unfortunately, for some, such moments destroy them.

It doesn’t have to be that way. It’s completely within our power to choose how we react to the strange and unexpected things life throws our way. We can feel sad or be destroyed by them or we can just have a good belly laugh over them; and by so doing, stomp those nasty buggers back down into the ground with our humor. When we choose the latter, our bad moments no longer hold any power over us. They can’t drag us down into the depths of despair and keep us there, denying us of our right to just be happy.

Truthfully, I’d much rather laugh than wage a war, against what’s now in the past, any day . . . even if it’s at my own expense.