Ever have one of those, "I think I forgot to teach something," moments? 

Last summer I found myself traveling at the speed of my screams, when it struck me that I was about to die and really, it was all my fault.  I had forgotten to teach Neeto about velocity, equal and opposite reactions, as well as first aid. 

At the time we lived in a house at the base of some rimrock.  You can't live near the base of rimrock without having a sloped driveway because rimrock is at the top of a rim, which is at the top of a pile of earth. 

The children loved to climb into the wagon and drive down the driveway.  They would laugh and shout as they rolled down the hill, and finally come to a stop a short distance from the bottom. 

I loved to watch them as it brought back memories of my childhood, riding wagons down hills, and driving it while someone else pushed.  One fine day I decided to relive my youth, and asked Neeto if she would like to accompany me. 

We climbed into the wagon, Neeto at the helm.  "Engage!" I barked, and we gave a little forward shift with our bodies to get the wagon rolling. 

The children always seemed to take the ride down at a slow to moderate pace.  Neeto and I quickly picked up speed as together we weighed around 300 lbs.  I began to realize that there was no way I wanted to finish this ride and told Neeto to stop the wagon.  She decided that to do this we should not take the bend in the road and instead travel to the level ground of wild desert. 

At the speed we were traveling I knew that we were not going to stop anytime soon, and that we would actually wind up in a forced stop at a barbed wire fence.  I made a command decision that it would be better for our bodies to finish out the ride and hollered, "TURN, TURN, TURN!"

Neeto taking me at my word, for once, yanked the wagon handle to turn.  I was certain we were going to tip over because she was cutting the wagon to sharply.  I leaned heavily to the right in order to keep my face from meeting the gravel.  "Not so sharp!" I screeched. 

We rounded the bend and found ourselves very near the rose bed that lined one side of the driveway.  Neeto gave the wagon handle another yank and I leaned heavily to the left to keep my now humbled personage from landing in the roses.  "Quit yanking that handle, you're going to kill us!" 

We managed to stay upright as we flew by three open mouthed children, no doubt in shock from the sight of their mother's eyes bulging out like a hamster hung upside down. 

We raced downhill, and we were suddenly faced with one of our goats sleeping in the middle of the driveway.  Neeto and I  began to scream at Ebony to wake up and prayed with all our might she would actually be alarmed and leap to safety.  She didn't. 

Neeto decided there was just enough room to pass Ebony to the left.  We whizzed by waking Ebony with a blast of wind.  She looked about her in quizzical goat fashion, and took to chewing her cud. 

Faster and faster we hurtled to our doom.  The driveway was now rather bumpy due to some heavy rains that had "washed away" some of the road and gravel.  We came to a rather large washout and Neeto once again steered to the left to avoid it.  Unfortuately it left no time to regain the center of the road.  We traveled over a culvert with our left wheels spinning in mid air as they hung over the edge.  We leaned heavily to the right to keep ourselves from taking a swim in the ditch. 

The ditch cleared, I noticed that I was no longer speaking coherently and had lost all sanity.  I was laughing hysterically, my hair was blowing in the wind and bugs were beached on my tongue.  Neeto was no doubt thinking that I would have to be put away. 

With no other obstacles, we zoomed to the finish breaking previous Nascar records.  Finally we came to a rolling stop.  I gathered my wits, stepped calmly from the wagon, and straightened my hair.  Neeto and I began the long hike back up to the house.  "Want to go again?"  Neeto asked with enthusiasm. 

"No, thank you." I said, as I picked a mosquito from my teeth.  "I realized that I have a few science lessons I need to prepare."   

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