What's your 40 time?

Being a former football player, it makes me laugh when I hear how much weight analysts and coaches put on a guy's 40-yard dash time. They believe that it is a good measuring stick for how "fast" a player is and how quick he'll be on the field. Well, other than when wide receivers run a fly route, how often does a football player ever actually run 40 yards in a straight line? Pretty much never.

Even though I've run track ever since I could walk, my 40 time was never that impressive. I would always tell people, "I'm not quick, I'm fast." Meaning that my first few steps weren't my best, but once I got going, you had better watch out. Once I became a cornerback in college, I dramatically improved my lateral speed - which comes in handy when you have to change directions all the time.

Well, this weekend I got to unofficially test my 40 speed for the first time since I began my retirement. Only this test was a much different situation than cleats and a stopwatch. Allow me to paint the picture for you...

It's probably 40 steps from the couch in our living room to Alli's crib. That includes walking across the living room and foyer, up the stairs to the second floor (which has two landings and takes three turns just to get into the hallway), down part of the hall, a 180-degree turn into her bedroom and a few steps across her room to her crib.

It was Sunday afternoon and Mommy B and I had just put Alli down for her afternoon nap and were lounging on the couch. After a few minutes of Alli crying (which is normal these days), it got quiet - which Mommy B and I took as a good sign that she was probably asleep or very close to it. Then, we both heard a loud noise come from upstairs. It sounded like something had hit the ground really hard.

Mommy B and I looked at each other for a split second and feared the worst - that she had fallen out of the crib. I was up off the couch and to the stairs faster than a jack rabbit - Mommy B close behind me. As I raced up the stairs, I couldn't help get more worried that I didn't hear Alli screaming. This could only mean that she had fallen out of the crib and had knocked herself out, right? Using the wall and railing to guide myself at breakneck speeds, I bounded up the stairs and flew through her bedroom door like it wasn't even there.

And that's when I found Alli...

Standing up, leaning on the side of the crib railing with a big smile on her face - perfectly safe and sound. My heart was racing, but I was finally able to take a breath once I saw that my baby girl was unharmed. Mommy B came in right behind me, and took a deep breath once she saw that Alli was okay. I picked Alli up, giggles and all, and held her close. I was so relieved that she hadn't fallen out of the crib.

I looked at the crib again and realized that since we just lowered it a couple weeks ago, there was no way she could have gotten out. So, I looked around the room to see what could have caused the loud noise we heard just moments before. Nothing seemed out of place in her room, which we found odd. I walked down the hall into the other bedrooms - nothing. Mommy B walked into our bathroom and found that her shampoo bottle had fallen off it's shelf and hit the floor of the shower.

We're still not sure what could have caused something like that to happen, other than ghosts, perhaps. Regardless, we were just happy that our little girl was safe. We put her back in her crib and went back downstairs. We both sat on the couch for a few minutes to let our hearts stop racing.

Mommy B commented that she's never seen me move that fast before. I said "It's a little different when it's your kid you're running after as opposed to a stranger with a football." I guess I still have some moves even in my retirement years. I'm not sure what my real 40 time might be these days, but now I know how fast I can make it from the couch to the crib - no time flat.