Sprawled out on the floor of the doctor’s office yesterday afternoon as two women handed me Nilla wafers, it became apparent that I was what one might call “prone” to passing out.
I passed out for the first time in the tenth grade during a family trip to Mount Vernon. Touring the old home, I felt incredibly hot and nauseous and moved over to the staircase to take a breather. I remember telling my brother I felt sick – just as I had at the movie theater – before waking up on the ground with my mother and a geriatric stranger underneath of me. I still feel particularly sorry for the elderly gentleman, as it was no small task to keep all of my dead weight from crashing to the ground. Tenth grade was not a particularly slender year for me, as you may remember.
The fact that I had passed out was of less concern to me than the state of my bangs, which my mother had started to smooth down to the sides of my forehead to make way for the wet paper towel. I was too weak to speak, but wanted to somehow express to her that my bangs were to be left on my face as-is.
A security guard got me a cup of water and escorted me to a special building, where he made a mandatory call to Mount Vernon security. “We have a woman here who passed out, looks to be around 28 or so.”
I was thrilled to pass for a 28 year-old, not realizing at the time that any 14 year-old who looks to be approaching thirty probably has some weight issues. Attempting to correct my bang situation, I assured my parents I was fine and we continued on with our tour.
A year later I passed out a second time after over-exerting myself during a particularly intense game of pick-up basketball on a Carnival cruise. I was determined to keep up with the guys on the court and had enough self-control to remain conscious until I returned to my cabin. I spent the next 15 minutes sitting on the floor of the shower stall, barely conscious and reminding myself that it would be incredibly inopportune to faint in a tiny cruise ship shower with the door locked. My brother was involved in an all-day ping pong tournament and wouldn’t be back to find me for hours.
Head traumas replaced fainting spells the following year, the first incident occurring during a Powder Puff football game in college. I am an incredibly competitive individual and treat most recreational sports with a disturbing level of seriousness traditionally reserved for professional athletics. Our team was behind with a minute or two remaining and I knew I had to get a touchdown or risk losing the game. Our quarterback launched a decent spiral into the air and I leapt in the end zone, forgetting I was neither in the NFL nor wearing padding of any sort. The result was a dropped ball and several torn ligaments in my neck.
That winter I continued to use and abuse my head in an effort to ensure permanent brain damage. Vacationing in Pennsylvania with my family and cousins, I decided to spice things up a bit. I could think of no greater game than launching my clog as far as possible in my cousin’s front yard, and insisted my family gather around as I prepared for the event. In all my excitement over another competition, I neglected to notice the large patches of ice below my feet, walking briskly on the driveway before shooting my right leg up in the air to launch the clog. My shoe went skyrocketing into the air as I slipped on a patch of ice and slammed the back of my head onto the driveway. My brother began laughing before realizing I was both unable to breath properly and crying. This didn’t seem to affect him greatly, as he refused to retrieve my clog. My New Year’s resolution the next evening was pretty clear: no concussions in 2006.
Much like my other resolutions in years past, I made it approximately three months concussion free before breaking the streak. Our school had an annual spring festival and I was delighted one Saturday in April to discover an assortment of challenges and games on the quad. Of particular interest was a huge moon bounce-esque obstacle course that was calling my name. I insisted on participating and encouraged my suitemate’s friend to race me through the course.
A normal person would have treated this moment as a friendly, fun activity, but I was not created like most, and saw the moon bounce challenge as the perfect opportunity to showcase my athletic prowess.
There was a small circular opening that you had to crawl through to enter the course, but when the whistle blew I decided to leap head first through the hole in an effort to shave a few seconds off of my course time. What I had not anticipated was bouncing into the air by way of head-first dive before landing directly on my neck, where I remained contorted for the next three minutes, convinced I was paralyzed. There was a very disturbing hot, tingling sensation in my neck, and I pictured my life as a paraplegic.
Finally managing to roll over, I knew I had to finish the course even if I had no hope of winning. (Picture the final scene in Cool Runnings).
I was incredibly disoriented as I pushed through the barricades and made my way to the climbing wall to find my competitor just in front of me. With a renewed zest, I leapt up the climbing wall, neck and neck with the other girl. The final portion of the course was a slide, but time was ticking and I decided to take another approach and jump off the top instead. I neglected to take into consideration the trampoline properties of a moon bounce, hitting the bottom of the obstacle course before being launched several feet away into the grassy quad, where I landed on my knees. I spent the next two days in a neck brace, distressed that my New Year’s resolution was already broken. ONE concussion in 2006!
I evaded head trauma for the remainder of sophomore year before returning to my tried and true fainting episodes the following fall. I had been holed up in the library working on a project for my journalism class. Looking through a heavy metal filing cabinet of newspaper archives, I located my article and slammed the filing drawer shut…right on my finger. The pain was surprisingly intense and I suddenly felt very faint. Never one to cause a scene, I discreetly walked behind the cabinets and out of eyesight before passing out like a true lady. I woke up soon thereafter, staring up at the ceiling before calmly exiting the library and calling my roommate. “Yeah…I’m gonna be a little late for dinner.”
My bad luck continued after college when I moved to Ireland and managed to produce a stomach ulcer requiring hospital attention. I have never been good with blood and immediately felt dizzy as the doctor stuck the needle in my arm. Moments later I was channeling the spirit of the exorcist, thrashing about wildly on the hospital table and knocking the needle out of my arm and onto the ground. I woke up to discover blood all over the place and my body drenched in sweat. Apparently I had not only passed out, but seized as well.
“I can’t find the needle!” the doctor said, searching the floor rather annoyed. Oh I’m sorry, I know this must be traumatizing for YOU.
Another phone call was made to my roommate, once again informing her I would be late for dinner. Seizure or no seizure, I still had manners.
Things continued to go downhill upon my return to the U.S., where I ha d the pleasure of passing out yet again, this time at the “lady doctor.” Mental note: paper gowns tear quite easily.
After fainting in my birthday suit, it became quite clear I had a serious problem on my hands. If I couldn’t withstand a tiny needle or physical exam, how the hell was I going to birth a child!?
I pushed these fears to the back of my mind as I entered the doctor’s office yesterday. I was simply going to get my ear checked, no need to faint.
Sitting on the stool as the nurse’s aide shoved a metal instrument into my ear, I started feeling a little nauseous. I knew my face was beginning to get pale and decided to nip this thing in the bud. “Umm could I just have a quick drink of water and lay down for a minute, I feel a bit faint,” I said.
After relaxing for a few minutes, I felt better and moved back over to the stool, where the nurse continued to stab into my ear canal. Once again, my face was draining of all color. “Yeah, I’m going to have to have another drink,” I said, standing up and walking over to the table. Just as the bathroom evaded me during Jungle 2 Jungle, I never made it to the table either, instead collapsing on the tile floor. When I came to, I was sprawled out on the floor, my hair a hot mess.
“Laura, are you okay? Laura, have some cookies,” the nurse said. I wanted to tell her my name was in fact “Lauren” but this didn’t seem like the time or place. Laura graciously accepted Nilla wafers while the doctor attempted to locate some orange juice. “The juice is expired,” she stated, and I settled for tap water.
I apologized multiple times to the doctors before smoothing down my dress and returning to the stool. “You’re going to have a serious problem when you have a child,” the doctor said.
As I drove back to work that afternoon, my hair pasted to my face, I began to ponder my next fainting spell. Would I pass out in the frozen food section, sprawled on top of the cream cheese containers? Or perhaps on a date, slipping out of consciousness mid-kiss. He would just think he was THAT good.
“No, really, I’m having a lovely time,” I would have to say, sweat dripping down my back, “but I’m going to need a candy bar, a moist towelette and a flat surface ASAP.”
The date would be surely be ruined, but as I sat there nibbling on my Butterfinger, I would see the one ray of sun peeking out through the storm cloud.
At least it’s a good story.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Thursday, August 20, 2009
I'm Telling You, I Itch!
A few days ago, my roommate expressed her concern regarding accommodations for our trip to Boston this September. The only reasonable hotels were located miles outside the city limits and we had no friends to speak of in the New England area. This only left one option: the hostel.
I have seen my fair share of hostels in the last two years and recognized Liz’s concerns. Yet, much like the public bus, I have always felt a sort of kinship to this cheap, if not sketchy, form of shelter.
My first hostel experience occurred two years ago during my time abroad. A few weeks into my trip, I spent a weekend in Wales. This initial hostel experience spoiled me, and I left the lovely abode with a disillusioned sense of cheap travel. Breakfast was free, the sheets appeared to be clean and there was a lovely den, complete with a fireplace and library for all to enjoy. Hostels were okay in my book.
After a handful of perfectly fine experiences in other places, my roommates and I began planning our spring break trip to Italy. Seasoned travelers by that point, or so we thought, we were confident in booking our own accommodations and secured our own hostels for both Rome and Florence. We had gone to the local STA office a few weeks prior and decided to let our cute travel agent, Toby, go ahead and book Venice on our behalf.
With uneventful stays in both Rome and Florence, we arrived in Venice eager to see what sort of palace Toby had booked.
After a ferry ride away from the touristy portion of Venice, we arrived at our hostel. Stepping inside, something did not seem right. Accustomed to the traditional 20-something crowd, we were surprised to see a soccer team full of 9 year-old boys in the cafeteria - the cafeteria which also served as the lobby.
We walked up to the front desk to check-in, slightly disturbed to find an elderly woman fishing through a giant laundry bin to our left. We soon learned this was where you fetched your “fresh” linens.
Despite some initial concerns, we lugged our suitcases up the stairs with a sense of hope. We would be spending our Easter here, afterall.
Trudging up to the top of the steps, we were immediately accosted by walls painted an ungodly shade of bright yellow. Instantly regretting that my sunglasses were out of reach, I proceeded ahead of the others and took a peak in our room.
I’ve never toured a women’s prison before, but I imagined it would have an uncanny look and feel to the room I was currently looking into.
Over 15 sets of bunk beds were lined up in the narrow space, stacked three high and nearly touching the ceiling. A cluster of Asian women were huddled together near the front of the room, muttering in broken English. I tried to prepare the girls as they walked over.
“Picture a prison.”
Hauling our luggage past the United Nations Women’s Correctional Gang, I was getting pretty alarmed. Damn that Toby!
By some small miracle I was to sleep on one of the bottom bunks, two strangers above me. I had enough trouble maneuvering a traditional set of bunk beds, never mind a threesome.
That evening I attempted to get a good night’s rest, which was incredibly difficult as the woman on top of me – so to speak – began yelling at the girls in the adjoining room to shut up. I imagined my life as this woman's bitch, forced to get a cropped haircut and go by the name of Lawrence.
The next morning I woke up feeling particularly itchy, but it was Easter morning and I had no time to dwell on paranoia. Besides, I had a free hot breakfast to look forward to!
We got dressed, squinted past the yellow walls and arrived at the cafeteria, where we grabbed trays and got in the serving line.
“Hot chocolate or coffee?” the woman on the other side asked me.
“Umm orange juice?”
“HOT CHOCOLATE OR COFFEE?”
Apparently write-ins were not acceptable. Grabbing my cup of hot chocolate, I waited for the next woman to serve me my breakfast. Instead, she plopped a hard roll on my tray and nudged me along.
Hot chocolate and a hard roll without butter were bad enough, but it was Easter morning! Toby would hear about this.
We sat silently at the table, gnawing at our rolls. I’ve always had a hearty appetite and one roll wasn’t going to hold me over for an hour, much less until lunch. After our five course meal, we bought some fruit at a local store, which once again hardly seemed sufficient. But food was becoming the least of my worries. The itching had not stopped.
That night we flew back to England. The next morning I woke up covered in little red bumps and was itching like crazy. My one roommate insisted this was “all in my head”, which was somewhat true. The red bumps WERE on my head, too.
After some frantic Google investigating, I came to the disturbing conclusion that thanks to Toby, I had gotten a troubling case of bed bugs from the Venetian prison.
For those of you who are fortunate enough to have never come down with bed bugs, the itching is not nearly as bad as the mental warfare this condition creates. To know your skin is infested with bugs you picked up from sheets out of a communal bin is a realization I wish on nobody. Well, except for Toby.
I purchased some anti-itch cream and looked like quite the prize as I answered the door that evening, covered in white medicated spots, to greet our very attractive handyman. Life was good.
I spent the rest of my time in England trying to avoid yellow walls and managed to return to the U.S. with nothing more than a slight mental condition.
The following year I arrived in Ireland and was generally pleased with the hostels I encountered. In the next five months I traveled the country without a harrowing story to be told.
And then I went back to England.
I had decided to return to Bath for a few days before moving back to the U.S., but was slightly apprehensive about my travel arrangements. Bridget wasn’t coming with me and it would be first time staying in a hostel without a friend.
Bath has very few accommodation options and I settled for the cheapest place I could find in the center of town. I didn’t plan on spending much time in the room anyway, and was willing to sacrifice a little luxury.
Had I known the emotional basket case I would become after leaving Ireland, I would have booked a private suite at the Ritz-Carlton, no expenses spared. I spent the first night in Bath sobbing uncontrollably in my hostel bed, which must have been very alarming for the five men who were sharing my room. Bridget was gone, Ireland was but a memory and I was miserable. Wearing flip flops in the shower and sleeping on top of my passport and valuables did not help. Listening to the man in the bunk next to mine moaning while lying in boxer briefs was no consolation, either.
The next day I was supposed to stay with an old high school friend who was living in a neighboring town, but plans fell through late in the day. Sitting in the basement of my old school after visiting my study abroad tutors, I realized I was without a place to stay that night. If I left the townhouse to venture out for food, there would be no guarantee I’d get back in. The tutors closed the building after 5 and if you didn’t know the code on the door pad, you couldn’t get in.
I sat at the computer, contemplating my options. It would be nearly impossible to find a hostel with an open bed and the couch in the basement looked pretty cozy. I knew a security guard came around at midnight to check the building, but I was praying he would go no further than the classrooms and bypass the basement turned living quarters.
It was only 6 pm and I had no more than a few cookies on me. Rationing them out over the next six hours like a World War II housewife feeding her eleven children, I moved to the couch around 10 pm. Setting an open textbook out on the table in front of me and keeping the lights on, I created the perfect scene. Should the security guard come downstairs, I would simply tell him I had fallen asleep studying.
I drifted off to sleep moments later, shivering on the tiny couch in my sweatshirt, jeans and sneakers. British plumbing and heating, FYI, is deplorable.
A few hours later, I woke up to the sound of someone coming down the steps. Oh God, I suddenly thought, springing up on the couch, what have I done?!
A security guard came around the corner to find me sitting on the couch, calmly holding a textbook. I tried to play it cool, rubbing my eyes and shaking my head. “Oh geez, I must have fallen asleep while studying!” I said, quickly gathering my things.
“That’s okay,” the pleasant man said, walking me outside. “Are you okay?”
“Oh yes,” I lied, standing there like a crazy bag lady with my backpack and a pair of sneakers in my hand. “I’m just going to head back to the house.”
A lot of thoughts crossed my mind as I wandered the streets of Bath at midnight, the most frequent of which being, “OH SHIT.” It was a freezing October night and I had nowhere to go, surrounded by crowds of drunken teenagers. If you’ve ever lived in England, you understand just how frightening those British adolescents can be.
I went to two hostels, both of which were full for the evening. I’m a fairly calm traveler but the idea of sleeping under the Pultney Bridge was too much, and despite falling for a very attractive homeless man the year prior, I had serious doubts he would still be in front of that same McDonalds, willing to lead me to a safe corner of town.
1 a.m. came and went before I stumbled upon one final YMCA hostel. By the grace of God, they informed me there were two beds available. I had never been so happy to sleep in a communal room in my entire life.
The next, and last, evening of my stay, I returned to the first hostel. The moaning man was still there.
Two more guys had also moved into the room and chatted with me briefly before going out to explore the city. With the room to myself for a short period of time, I began condensing my bags. Aer Lingus was a real bitch about excess luggage and I knew I’d have to throw away a few of my items prior to take-off. With that in mind, I tossed my Adidas shoes into the trashcan, taking a moment of silence to remember all the places they had been.
A few hours later the two guys returned. I watched from my bed as one of them walked over to the trashcan, peering in and yelling to his buddy. “Dude, someone left really good shoes in here!”
I raised the book I was reading in front of my face to conceal my laughter.
“Seriously, look at these,” he said, picking the right shoe up and examining it in the air.
“Don’t pick that up, you don’t know where that’s been!” the other one said.
The friend ignored him and continued inspecting my shoes. I watched in horror as he lowered his face into one of them. “They kind of smell and I think they might be women’s, but they’re in really good shape. Dude these are GOOD shoes! Why would someone throw them out?”
His friend looked fairly disgusted. "There's got to be a reason someone threw them out!"
Wholly unconvinced, the guy at the trashcan picked up the left counterpart and walked over to his bunk to try them on. “Fit like a GLOVE dude.”
It was incredibly hard to stifle my laughter as I watched the new shoe owner beaming at his second-hand Adidas before taking them off and placing them neatly next to his bunk.
That night after the boys went out on the town, I considered leaving a note on the shoes.
“Dude…these ARE women’s shoes. They were mine.” -Lauren.
Instead, I left the hostel quietly that night and headed to the train station, happy my shoes would continue to lead a life of travel and adventure. It was time for me to go home, but they had other places to see.
The following day I returned to the U.S. and the comforts of my own room, finally free from another hostel experience gone wrong.
My stay in Boston next month will be just shy of the one year anniversary since my last hostel experience in England and I can’t think of a better way to celebrate. Some prefer the luxuries of a clean hotel room, but I’m partial to the hostel, my home away from home during the most incredible two years of my life.
Despite my fond memories, there is a very real possibility that Liz’s concerns will come to fruition, and we’ll end up sitting in Fenway Park lathered in anti-itch ointment while strangers help themselves to our footwear. Should this be the case, I’ll no doubt console Liz, all the while hiding the smile spreading across my face and the realization I’ve come to embrace.
At least it’s a good story.
I have seen my fair share of hostels in the last two years and recognized Liz’s concerns. Yet, much like the public bus, I have always felt a sort of kinship to this cheap, if not sketchy, form of shelter.
My first hostel experience occurred two years ago during my time abroad. A few weeks into my trip, I spent a weekend in Wales. This initial hostel experience spoiled me, and I left the lovely abode with a disillusioned sense of cheap travel. Breakfast was free, the sheets appeared to be clean and there was a lovely den, complete with a fireplace and library for all to enjoy. Hostels were okay in my book.
After a handful of perfectly fine experiences in other places, my roommates and I began planning our spring break trip to Italy. Seasoned travelers by that point, or so we thought, we were confident in booking our own accommodations and secured our own hostels for both Rome and Florence. We had gone to the local STA office a few weeks prior and decided to let our cute travel agent, Toby, go ahead and book Venice on our behalf.
With uneventful stays in both Rome and Florence, we arrived in Venice eager to see what sort of palace Toby had booked.
After a ferry ride away from the touristy portion of Venice, we arrived at our hostel. Stepping inside, something did not seem right. Accustomed to the traditional 20-something crowd, we were surprised to see a soccer team full of 9 year-old boys in the cafeteria - the cafeteria which also served as the lobby.
We walked up to the front desk to check-in, slightly disturbed to find an elderly woman fishing through a giant laundry bin to our left. We soon learned this was where you fetched your “fresh” linens.
Despite some initial concerns, we lugged our suitcases up the stairs with a sense of hope. We would be spending our Easter here, afterall.
Trudging up to the top of the steps, we were immediately accosted by walls painted an ungodly shade of bright yellow. Instantly regretting that my sunglasses were out of reach, I proceeded ahead of the others and took a peak in our room.
I’ve never toured a women’s prison before, but I imagined it would have an uncanny look and feel to the room I was currently looking into.
Over 15 sets of bunk beds were lined up in the narrow space, stacked three high and nearly touching the ceiling. A cluster of Asian women were huddled together near the front of the room, muttering in broken English. I tried to prepare the girls as they walked over.
“Picture a prison.”
Hauling our luggage past the United Nations Women’s Correctional Gang, I was getting pretty alarmed. Damn that Toby!
By some small miracle I was to sleep on one of the bottom bunks, two strangers above me. I had enough trouble maneuvering a traditional set of bunk beds, never mind a threesome.
That evening I attempted to get a good night’s rest, which was incredibly difficult as the woman on top of me – so to speak – began yelling at the girls in the adjoining room to shut up. I imagined my life as this woman's bitch, forced to get a cropped haircut and go by the name of Lawrence.
The next morning I woke up feeling particularly itchy, but it was Easter morning and I had no time to dwell on paranoia. Besides, I had a free hot breakfast to look forward to!
We got dressed, squinted past the yellow walls and arrived at the cafeteria, where we grabbed trays and got in the serving line.
“Hot chocolate or coffee?” the woman on the other side asked me.
“Umm orange juice?”
“HOT CHOCOLATE OR COFFEE?”
Apparently write-ins were not acceptable. Grabbing my cup of hot chocolate, I waited for the next woman to serve me my breakfast. Instead, she plopped a hard roll on my tray and nudged me along.
Hot chocolate and a hard roll without butter were bad enough, but it was Easter morning! Toby would hear about this.
We sat silently at the table, gnawing at our rolls. I’ve always had a hearty appetite and one roll wasn’t going to hold me over for an hour, much less until lunch. After our five course meal, we bought some fruit at a local store, which once again hardly seemed sufficient. But food was becoming the least of my worries. The itching had not stopped.
That night we flew back to England. The next morning I woke up covered in little red bumps and was itching like crazy. My one roommate insisted this was “all in my head”, which was somewhat true. The red bumps WERE on my head, too.
After some frantic Google investigating, I came to the disturbing conclusion that thanks to Toby, I had gotten a troubling case of bed bugs from the Venetian prison.
For those of you who are fortunate enough to have never come down with bed bugs, the itching is not nearly as bad as the mental warfare this condition creates. To know your skin is infested with bugs you picked up from sheets out of a communal bin is a realization I wish on nobody. Well, except for Toby.
I purchased some anti-itch cream and looked like quite the prize as I answered the door that evening, covered in white medicated spots, to greet our very attractive handyman. Life was good.
I spent the rest of my time in England trying to avoid yellow walls and managed to return to the U.S. with nothing more than a slight mental condition.
The following year I arrived in Ireland and was generally pleased with the hostels I encountered. In the next five months I traveled the country without a harrowing story to be told.
And then I went back to England.
I had decided to return to Bath for a few days before moving back to the U.S., but was slightly apprehensive about my travel arrangements. Bridget wasn’t coming with me and it would be first time staying in a hostel without a friend.
Bath has very few accommodation options and I settled for the cheapest place I could find in the center of town. I didn’t plan on spending much time in the room anyway, and was willing to sacrifice a little luxury.
Had I known the emotional basket case I would become after leaving Ireland, I would have booked a private suite at the Ritz-Carlton, no expenses spared. I spent the first night in Bath sobbing uncontrollably in my hostel bed, which must have been very alarming for the five men who were sharing my room. Bridget was gone, Ireland was but a memory and I was miserable. Wearing flip flops in the shower and sleeping on top of my passport and valuables did not help. Listening to the man in the bunk next to mine moaning while lying in boxer briefs was no consolation, either.
The next day I was supposed to stay with an old high school friend who was living in a neighboring town, but plans fell through late in the day. Sitting in the basement of my old school after visiting my study abroad tutors, I realized I was without a place to stay that night. If I left the townhouse to venture out for food, there would be no guarantee I’d get back in. The tutors closed the building after 5 and if you didn’t know the code on the door pad, you couldn’t get in.
I sat at the computer, contemplating my options. It would be nearly impossible to find a hostel with an open bed and the couch in the basement looked pretty cozy. I knew a security guard came around at midnight to check the building, but I was praying he would go no further than the classrooms and bypass the basement turned living quarters.
It was only 6 pm and I had no more than a few cookies on me. Rationing them out over the next six hours like a World War II housewife feeding her eleven children, I moved to the couch around 10 pm. Setting an open textbook out on the table in front of me and keeping the lights on, I created the perfect scene. Should the security guard come downstairs, I would simply tell him I had fallen asleep studying.
I drifted off to sleep moments later, shivering on the tiny couch in my sweatshirt, jeans and sneakers. British plumbing and heating, FYI, is deplorable.
A few hours later, I woke up to the sound of someone coming down the steps. Oh God, I suddenly thought, springing up on the couch, what have I done?!
A security guard came around the corner to find me sitting on the couch, calmly holding a textbook. I tried to play it cool, rubbing my eyes and shaking my head. “Oh geez, I must have fallen asleep while studying!” I said, quickly gathering my things.
“That’s okay,” the pleasant man said, walking me outside. “Are you okay?”
“Oh yes,” I lied, standing there like a crazy bag lady with my backpack and a pair of sneakers in my hand. “I’m just going to head back to the house.”
A lot of thoughts crossed my mind as I wandered the streets of Bath at midnight, the most frequent of which being, “OH SHIT.” It was a freezing October night and I had nowhere to go, surrounded by crowds of drunken teenagers. If you’ve ever lived in England, you understand just how frightening those British adolescents can be.
I went to two hostels, both of which were full for the evening. I’m a fairly calm traveler but the idea of sleeping under the Pultney Bridge was too much, and despite falling for a very attractive homeless man the year prior, I had serious doubts he would still be in front of that same McDonalds, willing to lead me to a safe corner of town.
1 a.m. came and went before I stumbled upon one final YMCA hostel. By the grace of God, they informed me there were two beds available. I had never been so happy to sleep in a communal room in my entire life.
The next, and last, evening of my stay, I returned to the first hostel. The moaning man was still there.
Two more guys had also moved into the room and chatted with me briefly before going out to explore the city. With the room to myself for a short period of time, I began condensing my bags. Aer Lingus was a real bitch about excess luggage and I knew I’d have to throw away a few of my items prior to take-off. With that in mind, I tossed my Adidas shoes into the trashcan, taking a moment of silence to remember all the places they had been.
A few hours later the two guys returned. I watched from my bed as one of them walked over to the trashcan, peering in and yelling to his buddy. “Dude, someone left really good shoes in here!”
I raised the book I was reading in front of my face to conceal my laughter.
“Seriously, look at these,” he said, picking the right shoe up and examining it in the air.
“Don’t pick that up, you don’t know where that’s been!” the other one said.
The friend ignored him and continued inspecting my shoes. I watched in horror as he lowered his face into one of them. “They kind of smell and I think they might be women’s, but they’re in really good shape. Dude these are GOOD shoes! Why would someone throw them out?”
His friend looked fairly disgusted. "There's got to be a reason someone threw them out!"
Wholly unconvinced, the guy at the trashcan picked up the left counterpart and walked over to his bunk to try them on. “Fit like a GLOVE dude.”
It was incredibly hard to stifle my laughter as I watched the new shoe owner beaming at his second-hand Adidas before taking them off and placing them neatly next to his bunk.
That night after the boys went out on the town, I considered leaving a note on the shoes.
“Dude…these ARE women’s shoes. They were mine.” -Lauren.
Instead, I left the hostel quietly that night and headed to the train station, happy my shoes would continue to lead a life of travel and adventure. It was time for me to go home, but they had other places to see.
The following day I returned to the U.S. and the comforts of my own room, finally free from another hostel experience gone wrong.
My stay in Boston next month will be just shy of the one year anniversary since my last hostel experience in England and I can’t think of a better way to celebrate. Some prefer the luxuries of a clean hotel room, but I’m partial to the hostel, my home away from home during the most incredible two years of my life.
Despite my fond memories, there is a very real possibility that Liz’s concerns will come to fruition, and we’ll end up sitting in Fenway Park lathered in anti-itch ointment while strangers help themselves to our footwear. Should this be the case, I’ll no doubt console Liz, all the while hiding the smile spreading across my face and the realization I’ve come to embrace.
At least it’s a good story.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Hey, It's Lamb Chops!
For most, Halloween is but a distant thought, lagging behind last minute summer barbeques, the farewell to white come Labor Day, and the first pile of red and orange leaves.
But I am not most. For me, Halloween has always been THE holiday, and one that must be planned months in advance if done properly. And so I began my brainstorming last evening, weighed down with the burden of picking the perfect costume.
I’ve come a long way, costume wise, since the five consecutive Halloweens that I paraded around as a five to eight year old witch. My creativity wasn’t in high supply at the time, but I loved my costume and knew better than to ruin a good thing.
The particularly religious friends I had were only allowed to wear cheerful costumes, their parents surely viewing our witch and vampire ensembles as the devil’s work. I always felt especially sad for them as I watched my brother put the final touches of fake blood on his face.
My mother may have given us the secular freedom we desired, but she wasn’t one to waste money, placing store-bought Halloween costumes into the same category as the Lunchables: overpriced consumer goods we already had at home. And so each Halloween, my younger brother and I would root through the giant black trash bag of costumes my mother had collected over the years, searching for the perfect ensemble. The problem was that there were very few complete costumes in the bag. A cowboy hat, a witch’s broom and a hippie vest were all great accessories, but hardly the makings of an award-winning outfit.
Despite the wardrobe challenges, I finally hung up my witch hat and moved on to bigger and better things. Following an especially lucrative trip to Epcot one October, I emerged that Halloween as an impeccably dressed Japanese woman, complete with an authentic rice hat and decorative fan. To complete the costume, my mother covered my face in white powder. In hindsight, this final touch may have been offensive to the Japanese community.
The following year I continued to represent various ethnicities, this time posing as a Mexican man. The painted black moustache and brightly colored, striped blanket wrapped around my body screamed Little Tijuana, but it was the sombrero with the box of Hot Tamales resting on the brim that really completed the package. The costume became a real nuisance, as homeowners would demand to hear a little Espanol before handing over the goods. This clever back and forth always ended with me saying, “Je parle francais,” disappointment registering on their faces and they tossed me a Baby Ruth and closed the door.
My language skills aside, I was becoming quite the expert at trick-or-treating. The trick was to hit an upper middle class neighborhood, bypassing both the humble communities with stingy residents and the rich ones with massive yards that made it impossible to hit the proper number of homes in that two hour window of time. With this in mind, my mother began taking us to my best friend’s neighborhood, where the candy-lawn size ratio was perfect.
I’ve always been an incredibly competitive individual, which may explain the pure joy I felt every Halloween as I ran feverishly from house to house, always remembering to say “trick or treat” and “thank you” in the hope of collecting a bag full of candy too heavy to hold. Each year I would collapse on the floor at 8:01 pm, dumping out my bag of treats for inspection. From there, the candy would be separated into categories. Candy bars on one side, sweet things on the other, Jehovah's Witness pamphlets in the trash. Lollipops and Smarties were in a fourth category: cheap shit.
After the candy was separated into piles, trading would commence. My bartering skills improved with each Halloween, as I learned how to negotiate with the finesse of a divorce attorney. Three twix bars for one Butterfinger and a lollipop…not so fast.
While I viewed the world of Halloween candy collection with the utmost respect, my mother was far more cavalier. I still remember one particularly painful Halloween when she answered our door well past the standard 6-8 pm trick or treating time in our neighborhood to find two teenage boys on the doorstep, one of them in a wheelchair. “Trick or treat!” the paraplegic said.
My mother politely excused herself for a minute before running upstairs, where my brother and I had spread out all of our candy. “Kids, I ran out of Halloween candy and there is a boy at the door in a wheelchair and I feel sorry for him. Give me some of your candy.” I was in no mood to hand over my coveted Butterfingers, wheelchair or not, settling for a few fun sized candy bars I wasn’t as crazy about. I felt sorry for the kid too, but rules are rules.
By the time I entered high school, most of my friends had stopped trick-or-treating, a decision that boggled my 14 year-old mind. Why anyone would skip the ritual of running frantically for two hours in the pursuit of free candy was beyond me. Unphased by my peers, I emerged that Halloween in my best costume to date: Mary Katherine Gallagher. Save a few embarrassing “Superstaaar”s I had to do on command, I counted my candy that night with a real sense of satisfaction.
I continued to trick-or treat for the next three years and entered my freshman year of college with two costumes already in tow. That October I discovered I was just about the only college student on campus interested in trick or treating. A little discouraged, I decided I wouldn’t let this disturbing adult behavior bring me down. Clad in an intricate Little Bo’ Peep dress my mother had made herself, I set out on my own that night.
Walking down the street in a nearby neighborhood, I began to feel very out of place. There wasn’t anyone over the age of ten in sight and young mothers were sending disapproving stares my way. Nervously approaching my first house, I rang the doorbell. “Trick-or-treat,” I mumbled, trailing off at the end as the homeowner’s distaste became quite obvious. Apparently there was something particularly offensive about a 5’7”, 19 year-old college student indulging in a joyful holiday tradition. Seemingly disgusted, she tossed a Kit Kat in my bag and shut the door. Two houses later, I knew I wasn’t welcome in the neighborhood. I walked back up to campus, three measly candy bars in my bag, utterly dejected. I knew Halloween would never be the same again.
I returned to the dorm room looking rather depressed as I recounted my tale to others. I was then informed that trick-or-treating over the age of 16 is “frowned upon” in Virginia. Some would even call it illegal.
A lot of questions raced through my mind at that moment. WHY did I pick a school in Virginia and WHAT would they do to Little Bo’ Peep in the slammer were two of them.
In an attempt to cheer myself up, I decided it was time to put on the second costume I brought from home: a homemade head-to-toe sheep. I spent the next twenty minutes walking up and down the halls of my freshman dorm, creating quite a stir in the process. Determined to save the holiday, I marched down campus to the auditorium and entered the costume contest. Five minutes later, backed behind tremendous crowd applause, I won first place. Most of the kids thought I was Lamb Chops, but to-mato, tom-a-to.
I had to say goodbye to traditional trick-or-treating that fall of 2004, but that didn’t mean the costumes had to end. It is a well known fact that Halloween is an excuse for college girls to dress like sluts, but I was determined to forgo the skimpy skirts and suggestive mouse ears in favor of a legitimate costume. With a renewed sense of spirit sophomore year, I went to a costume party dressed as a tube of Crest toothpaste. My mother had sewn the white felt costume during my fall break, carefully cutting out the blue and red letters to spell “Crest.” To top it off, I wore a white lampshade on my head intended to resemble the cap of the toothpaste. Lampshade in place and digging into my skull, I doused my cheeks and forehead in baby powder before coating my face with a thick layer of hairspray to make the powder stick.
The costume was by far my most creative, but left little room for movement as I tried to dance at the bar. Mistaken at times for a lampshade, I was also accosted by two drunk freshman who sandwiched me between them before bouncing me back and forth, Night at the Roxbury style, in an attempt to “squeeze the toothpaste.” It was a harrowing evening, but I slept soundly that night, another Halloween done right.
After all of the hulabaloo I caused as a toothpaste tube and a junior year Girl Scout costume that was sub-par, there was an enormous amount of pressure senior year to pull off an amazing outfit. I toyed with the idea of posing as Lorena Bobbit, complete with a knife, nightgown, serial-killer esque hair and a hot dog in a jar, but my friends suggested I wear something less abrasive to the male sex if I had any hope of finding a dance partner that evening.
Naturally, I went with option number two: crazy cat lady. I spent hours that Halloween attaching dozens of feline pictures onto my blue robe. The night of the party I had my hair in Dollar Store curlers, cat toys dangling from the pockets of my blue robe, nylons that came just above the ankles, glasses and blue slippers. As a final accessory, I carried a cat bowl with frosted flakes taped to the bottom, the name “Fluffy Meowington” scrawled on the front with a black Sharpe.
The epitome of sexy, I arrived at my roommate’s boyfriend’s apartment to find a handful of guys eyeing my costume with intrigue. One of the guys finally came over, taking a good long look before speaking. “You’re not expecting to hook up with dudes in THAT costume, are you?!”
Apparently not.
I spent that evening at the costume party just as I had the last two years; an outsider in a sea of sluts. An outsider with another amazing costume, might I add.
In the years to come before I have my own children (and a legitimate excuse to re-enter the world of trick-or-treating), I will continue to uphold the standards I set for myself as a young child in any venue I can.
This year will be no different, as I spend the next two months fashioning the perfect costume. With any luck, I’ll create another masterpiece, something surely ill-suited for meeting and mingling with “dudes.” And if by chance I meet my soulmate at the punch bowl while attempting to balance my hot dog in a jar and butcher’s knife, well…..
At least it’s a good story.
But I am not most. For me, Halloween has always been THE holiday, and one that must be planned months in advance if done properly. And so I began my brainstorming last evening, weighed down with the burden of picking the perfect costume.
I’ve come a long way, costume wise, since the five consecutive Halloweens that I paraded around as a five to eight year old witch. My creativity wasn’t in high supply at the time, but I loved my costume and knew better than to ruin a good thing.
The particularly religious friends I had were only allowed to wear cheerful costumes, their parents surely viewing our witch and vampire ensembles as the devil’s work. I always felt especially sad for them as I watched my brother put the final touches of fake blood on his face.
My mother may have given us the secular freedom we desired, but she wasn’t one to waste money, placing store-bought Halloween costumes into the same category as the Lunchables: overpriced consumer goods we already had at home. And so each Halloween, my younger brother and I would root through the giant black trash bag of costumes my mother had collected over the years, searching for the perfect ensemble. The problem was that there were very few complete costumes in the bag. A cowboy hat, a witch’s broom and a hippie vest were all great accessories, but hardly the makings of an award-winning outfit.
Despite the wardrobe challenges, I finally hung up my witch hat and moved on to bigger and better things. Following an especially lucrative trip to Epcot one October, I emerged that Halloween as an impeccably dressed Japanese woman, complete with an authentic rice hat and decorative fan. To complete the costume, my mother covered my face in white powder. In hindsight, this final touch may have been offensive to the Japanese community.
The following year I continued to represent various ethnicities, this time posing as a Mexican man. The painted black moustache and brightly colored, striped blanket wrapped around my body screamed Little Tijuana, but it was the sombrero with the box of Hot Tamales resting on the brim that really completed the package. The costume became a real nuisance, as homeowners would demand to hear a little Espanol before handing over the goods. This clever back and forth always ended with me saying, “Je parle francais,” disappointment registering on their faces and they tossed me a Baby Ruth and closed the door.
My language skills aside, I was becoming quite the expert at trick-or-treating. The trick was to hit an upper middle class neighborhood, bypassing both the humble communities with stingy residents and the rich ones with massive yards that made it impossible to hit the proper number of homes in that two hour window of time. With this in mind, my mother began taking us to my best friend’s neighborhood, where the candy-lawn size ratio was perfect.
I’ve always been an incredibly competitive individual, which may explain the pure joy I felt every Halloween as I ran feverishly from house to house, always remembering to say “trick or treat” and “thank you” in the hope of collecting a bag full of candy too heavy to hold. Each year I would collapse on the floor at 8:01 pm, dumping out my bag of treats for inspection. From there, the candy would be separated into categories. Candy bars on one side, sweet things on the other, Jehovah's Witness pamphlets in the trash. Lollipops and Smarties were in a fourth category: cheap shit.
After the candy was separated into piles, trading would commence. My bartering skills improved with each Halloween, as I learned how to negotiate with the finesse of a divorce attorney. Three twix bars for one Butterfinger and a lollipop…not so fast.
While I viewed the world of Halloween candy collection with the utmost respect, my mother was far more cavalier. I still remember one particularly painful Halloween when she answered our door well past the standard 6-8 pm trick or treating time in our neighborhood to find two teenage boys on the doorstep, one of them in a wheelchair. “Trick or treat!” the paraplegic said.
My mother politely excused herself for a minute before running upstairs, where my brother and I had spread out all of our candy. “Kids, I ran out of Halloween candy and there is a boy at the door in a wheelchair and I feel sorry for him. Give me some of your candy.” I was in no mood to hand over my coveted Butterfingers, wheelchair or not, settling for a few fun sized candy bars I wasn’t as crazy about. I felt sorry for the kid too, but rules are rules.
By the time I entered high school, most of my friends had stopped trick-or-treating, a decision that boggled my 14 year-old mind. Why anyone would skip the ritual of running frantically for two hours in the pursuit of free candy was beyond me. Unphased by my peers, I emerged that Halloween in my best costume to date: Mary Katherine Gallagher. Save a few embarrassing “Superstaaar”s I had to do on command, I counted my candy that night with a real sense of satisfaction.
I continued to trick-or treat for the next three years and entered my freshman year of college with two costumes already in tow. That October I discovered I was just about the only college student on campus interested in trick or treating. A little discouraged, I decided I wouldn’t let this disturbing adult behavior bring me down. Clad in an intricate Little Bo’ Peep dress my mother had made herself, I set out on my own that night.
Walking down the street in a nearby neighborhood, I began to feel very out of place. There wasn’t anyone over the age of ten in sight and young mothers were sending disapproving stares my way. Nervously approaching my first house, I rang the doorbell. “Trick-or-treat,” I mumbled, trailing off at the end as the homeowner’s distaste became quite obvious. Apparently there was something particularly offensive about a 5’7”, 19 year-old college student indulging in a joyful holiday tradition. Seemingly disgusted, she tossed a Kit Kat in my bag and shut the door. Two houses later, I knew I wasn’t welcome in the neighborhood. I walked back up to campus, three measly candy bars in my bag, utterly dejected. I knew Halloween would never be the same again.
I returned to the dorm room looking rather depressed as I recounted my tale to others. I was then informed that trick-or-treating over the age of 16 is “frowned upon” in Virginia. Some would even call it illegal.
A lot of questions raced through my mind at that moment. WHY did I pick a school in Virginia and WHAT would they do to Little Bo’ Peep in the slammer were two of them.
In an attempt to cheer myself up, I decided it was time to put on the second costume I brought from home: a homemade head-to-toe sheep. I spent the next twenty minutes walking up and down the halls of my freshman dorm, creating quite a stir in the process. Determined to save the holiday, I marched down campus to the auditorium and entered the costume contest. Five minutes later, backed behind tremendous crowd applause, I won first place. Most of the kids thought I was Lamb Chops, but to-mato, tom-a-to.
I had to say goodbye to traditional trick-or-treating that fall of 2004, but that didn’t mean the costumes had to end. It is a well known fact that Halloween is an excuse for college girls to dress like sluts, but I was determined to forgo the skimpy skirts and suggestive mouse ears in favor of a legitimate costume. With a renewed sense of spirit sophomore year, I went to a costume party dressed as a tube of Crest toothpaste. My mother had sewn the white felt costume during my fall break, carefully cutting out the blue and red letters to spell “Crest.” To top it off, I wore a white lampshade on my head intended to resemble the cap of the toothpaste. Lampshade in place and digging into my skull, I doused my cheeks and forehead in baby powder before coating my face with a thick layer of hairspray to make the powder stick.
The costume was by far my most creative, but left little room for movement as I tried to dance at the bar. Mistaken at times for a lampshade, I was also accosted by two drunk freshman who sandwiched me between them before bouncing me back and forth, Night at the Roxbury style, in an attempt to “squeeze the toothpaste.” It was a harrowing evening, but I slept soundly that night, another Halloween done right.
After all of the hulabaloo I caused as a toothpaste tube and a junior year Girl Scout costume that was sub-par, there was an enormous amount of pressure senior year to pull off an amazing outfit. I toyed with the idea of posing as Lorena Bobbit, complete with a knife, nightgown, serial-killer esque hair and a hot dog in a jar, but my friends suggested I wear something less abrasive to the male sex if I had any hope of finding a dance partner that evening.
Naturally, I went with option number two: crazy cat lady. I spent hours that Halloween attaching dozens of feline pictures onto my blue robe. The night of the party I had my hair in Dollar Store curlers, cat toys dangling from the pockets of my blue robe, nylons that came just above the ankles, glasses and blue slippers. As a final accessory, I carried a cat bowl with frosted flakes taped to the bottom, the name “Fluffy Meowington” scrawled on the front with a black Sharpe.
The epitome of sexy, I arrived at my roommate’s boyfriend’s apartment to find a handful of guys eyeing my costume with intrigue. One of the guys finally came over, taking a good long look before speaking. “You’re not expecting to hook up with dudes in THAT costume, are you?!”
Apparently not.
I spent that evening at the costume party just as I had the last two years; an outsider in a sea of sluts. An outsider with another amazing costume, might I add.
In the years to come before I have my own children (and a legitimate excuse to re-enter the world of trick-or-treating), I will continue to uphold the standards I set for myself as a young child in any venue I can.
This year will be no different, as I spend the next two months fashioning the perfect costume. With any luck, I’ll create another masterpiece, something surely ill-suited for meeting and mingling with “dudes.” And if by chance I meet my soulmate at the punch bowl while attempting to balance my hot dog in a jar and butcher’s knife, well…..
At least it’s a good story.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
"Gorgeous"
I’ve never had good luck with public transportation, buses being no exception. The plethora of horror stories I've accumulated since childhood would lead the average person to an alternative mode of transport, but the bus inexplicably remains my safety blanket in the world of travel. No matter how many times it uses and abuses me, I always come back for more.
For various reasons, I didn’t get my license until sophomore year in college, instead riding the big yellow school bus up until the very last day of high school. This would have embarrassed most, but I always enjoyed my ride in the very first seat behind the bus driver. I’ve never been one to look for trouble and never ventured past the first or second row of the bus as a result. I wasn’t named homecoming queen because of it, but I managed to escape the shenanigans in the back.
The only trouble I ever had began in sixth grade when a girl two years older than me decided to sit next to me every day to get under my skin. She also decided to call me Betty. Mocking was one thing, but my name was not Betty! I spent the next year reminding her on a daily basis that my parents named me Lauren, thank you very much. She didn’t seem to care.
Sixth grade came and went and I continued to ride the bus for the next six years with my name and honor intact.
After high school, I graduated from the public school bus to the Greyhound, which was always a real treat. My trips from Fredericksburg to Baltimore around each holiday were not for the faint of heart, and almost always involved a passenger with no legs. The drive from college would have taken two and a half hours at most, but the Greyhound operated much like the pony express and doubled that time. Part of the problem was the token legless passenger, who took an extra fifteen minutes to get off the bus and use the restroom during one of our many stops. I’m in no way mocking the disabled, just explaining why it would have been faster for me to rollerblade down I-95.
The Baltimore station was always the scariest and most disorganized of the stops. Traveling home for a wedding one Friday night in college, I had the pleasure of watching the bus driver search each of the ten buses in the terminal for my luggage. He couldn’t seem to tell me why my luggage had moved from MY bus, finally finding it underneath a Greyhound minutes away from leaving for Salt Lake City. I had always wanted to check out Utah, but this was not the time or place.
I finally got my license, and therefore a car, halfway through college, but reverted back to public transportation while studying abroad in England my junior year. We were doing a ton of traveling in those four months and money was getting tight, so I suggested we forgo the traditional plane and take a bus to Paris instead. How bad could a 13-hour ride really be?
We left our place in Bath at 3 am the morning of our trip and boarded the bus. It was strangely full for a middle of the night departure and we had to quickly scan the rows for any available seats. I immediately saw an opening in the first row and plopped down while my other three roommates headed further back.
Upon first glance, the man sitting to my left in the window seat appeared to be your average bloke. But after getting situated and glancing back over, I started to take better inventory. A portly gentleman who spilled over into my seat, the man appeared to be homeless in both looks and smell. He had tufts of hair missing from his head and fingers that resembled sausage links. He flashed a smile and I began to feel a bit uneasy about the journey ahead.
Sitting back in my seat, I put in my earphones and closed my eyes, hoping to sleep for the next three hours before our stop in London. After what must have been no longer than fifteen minutes, I woke up to the feel of something on my thigh. Eyes still shut, I realized Sausage Fingers had his hand on my leg, massaging my left thigh in a circular motion. His fingers felt incredibly heavy and I sat there motionless, trying to decide what to do. I could suddenly feel him moving closer to me, his breath on my neck as he whispered “gorgeous” into my ear. Enough was enough.
I opened my eyes and shot him the meanest look I could muster. I’m not sure it came across that way, as I’ve never been one for confrontation, but he removed his hand from my leg. I turned around and met Bridget’s gaze, attempting to silently convey the molestation that had just occurred. Once again, my facial expression failed to deliver the correct message and Bridget simply smiled and waved before closing her eyes.
Turning back around, I was at a loss. If I fell back asleep, God only knows where those paws would roam. But if I stayed awake, I would risk verbal interaction with him. I opted for choice two and tried to focus on the sweet jams of Gavin DeGraw coming through my earphones. Sausage Fingers still wanted more, though! Half an hour after the unsolicited leg massage, he once again placed his stumps on my leg, this time shifting all of this weight on my body while attempting to remove his Velcro shoes. When he finally removed them, it became quite clear Sausage Fingers had been wearing the same Velcro shoes for about 18 years. I was also fairly certain a large rodent of some sort had recently crawled into one of them before taking its last breath.
Looking back, this would have been the appropriate moment to speak up. Something like “kindly remove your sausage links from my leg,” would have worked. For those who prefer a more direct approach, “fuck off!”
Instead, I said nothing, and waiting patiently for him to play Mr. Rogers.
Two and a half excruciating hours later, Sausage Fingers exited the bus. Ten hours later we arrived in Paris.
In the years since that night in 2007 when a homeless man with seemingly kind eyes took advantage of me, Sausage Fingers has turned into a legend of mythic proportions. I often think back to 11-year-old Lauren, sitting on the yellow school bus, answering to “Betty” and unaware of the path that would soon lead her to Sausage Fingers.
Years from now when I put my own daughter on the school bus for the very first time, a tear or two in my eyes, I’ll surely wonder what lies ahead. She’ll no doubt call me from a pay phone after her first foreign groping, feeling vulnerable and used. Like any good mother, I’ll offer her words of encouragement and advice, before reminding her of the most important thing.
At least it’s a good story.
For various reasons, I didn’t get my license until sophomore year in college, instead riding the big yellow school bus up until the very last day of high school. This would have embarrassed most, but I always enjoyed my ride in the very first seat behind the bus driver. I’ve never been one to look for trouble and never ventured past the first or second row of the bus as a result. I wasn’t named homecoming queen because of it, but I managed to escape the shenanigans in the back.
The only trouble I ever had began in sixth grade when a girl two years older than me decided to sit next to me every day to get under my skin. She also decided to call me Betty. Mocking was one thing, but my name was not Betty! I spent the next year reminding her on a daily basis that my parents named me Lauren, thank you very much. She didn’t seem to care.
Sixth grade came and went and I continued to ride the bus for the next six years with my name and honor intact.
After high school, I graduated from the public school bus to the Greyhound, which was always a real treat. My trips from Fredericksburg to Baltimore around each holiday were not for the faint of heart, and almost always involved a passenger with no legs. The drive from college would have taken two and a half hours at most, but the Greyhound operated much like the pony express and doubled that time. Part of the problem was the token legless passenger, who took an extra fifteen minutes to get off the bus and use the restroom during one of our many stops. I’m in no way mocking the disabled, just explaining why it would have been faster for me to rollerblade down I-95.
The Baltimore station was always the scariest and most disorganized of the stops. Traveling home for a wedding one Friday night in college, I had the pleasure of watching the bus driver search each of the ten buses in the terminal for my luggage. He couldn’t seem to tell me why my luggage had moved from MY bus, finally finding it underneath a Greyhound minutes away from leaving for Salt Lake City. I had always wanted to check out Utah, but this was not the time or place.
I finally got my license, and therefore a car, halfway through college, but reverted back to public transportation while studying abroad in England my junior year. We were doing a ton of traveling in those four months and money was getting tight, so I suggested we forgo the traditional plane and take a bus to Paris instead. How bad could a 13-hour ride really be?
We left our place in Bath at 3 am the morning of our trip and boarded the bus. It was strangely full for a middle of the night departure and we had to quickly scan the rows for any available seats. I immediately saw an opening in the first row and plopped down while my other three roommates headed further back.
Upon first glance, the man sitting to my left in the window seat appeared to be your average bloke. But after getting situated and glancing back over, I started to take better inventory. A portly gentleman who spilled over into my seat, the man appeared to be homeless in both looks and smell. He had tufts of hair missing from his head and fingers that resembled sausage links. He flashed a smile and I began to feel a bit uneasy about the journey ahead.
Sitting back in my seat, I put in my earphones and closed my eyes, hoping to sleep for the next three hours before our stop in London. After what must have been no longer than fifteen minutes, I woke up to the feel of something on my thigh. Eyes still shut, I realized Sausage Fingers had his hand on my leg, massaging my left thigh in a circular motion. His fingers felt incredibly heavy and I sat there motionless, trying to decide what to do. I could suddenly feel him moving closer to me, his breath on my neck as he whispered “gorgeous” into my ear. Enough was enough.
I opened my eyes and shot him the meanest look I could muster. I’m not sure it came across that way, as I’ve never been one for confrontation, but he removed his hand from my leg. I turned around and met Bridget’s gaze, attempting to silently convey the molestation that had just occurred. Once again, my facial expression failed to deliver the correct message and Bridget simply smiled and waved before closing her eyes.
Turning back around, I was at a loss. If I fell back asleep, God only knows where those paws would roam. But if I stayed awake, I would risk verbal interaction with him. I opted for choice two and tried to focus on the sweet jams of Gavin DeGraw coming through my earphones. Sausage Fingers still wanted more, though! Half an hour after the unsolicited leg massage, he once again placed his stumps on my leg, this time shifting all of this weight on my body while attempting to remove his Velcro shoes. When he finally removed them, it became quite clear Sausage Fingers had been wearing the same Velcro shoes for about 18 years. I was also fairly certain a large rodent of some sort had recently crawled into one of them before taking its last breath.
Looking back, this would have been the appropriate moment to speak up. Something like “kindly remove your sausage links from my leg,” would have worked. For those who prefer a more direct approach, “fuck off!”
Instead, I said nothing, and waiting patiently for him to play Mr. Rogers.
Two and a half excruciating hours later, Sausage Fingers exited the bus. Ten hours later we arrived in Paris.
In the years since that night in 2007 when a homeless man with seemingly kind eyes took advantage of me, Sausage Fingers has turned into a legend of mythic proportions. I often think back to 11-year-old Lauren, sitting on the yellow school bus, answering to “Betty” and unaware of the path that would soon lead her to Sausage Fingers.
Years from now when I put my own daughter on the school bus for the very first time, a tear or two in my eyes, I’ll surely wonder what lies ahead. She’ll no doubt call me from a pay phone after her first foreign groping, feeling vulnerable and used. Like any good mother, I’ll offer her words of encouragement and advice, before reminding her of the most important thing.
At least it’s a good story.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Are You Looking In the Rafters?
Relaxing on the balcony of my apartment over the weekend, I took a moment to bask in the comfort of my surroundings.
There was a time not too long ago when my only goal was to get out of my hostel-turned-home in Ireland and into a place where I didn’t have to wear flip flops in the shower. A time when I yearned for the comfort of sheets free from a plethora of stains and bug eggs. A time when…well, you get the picture.
A few days into our trip, my friends and I began the search for a home of our own. We were going to be in Galway for the next five months and the hostel was no place to return after a hard day of work. How were we to know that only one of us would ever find a job anyway?
The friendly guy at the front desk of the hostel suggested we get up early on Thursday when the Galway Advertiser included its weekly housing insert. There were several ads that looked fairly promising and we bunkered down in our room that morning, armed with a cell phone, pad and paper, our hopes and dreams, and the stares of a creepy girl in an adjacent bunk who spent her days in the hostel reading behind a makeshift curtain she had constructed out of a bath towel.
With her as our inspiration, we knew we had to find another place to live.
Bridget had the best phone voice and was enlisted to make the calls. We managed to create a decent list of about five places to check out and made appointments for the following day. I had a good feeling about this.
That night we decided to get a sneak preview of our first option, just to get an idea of what we were dealing with prior to our actual appointment. Patrick’s home on Cabbage Lane sounded like a real dime piece and was just outside the city center, but as we roamed the streets with our map, we couldn’t figure out where the hell Cabbage Lane was. We passed the street before it on the map and the street after it, but there was nothing in between, save a dingy alley.
After walking back and forth for over half an hour, past the cemetery and back to the city center, we decided to take a stroll down the alley. An incredibly safe decision as the final light of day disappeared. I had never been to the Soviet Union, but I was fairly certain it had the same bombed-out flair of this alley. Large chunks of stone and brick were missing from the narrow walls and the barbed wire lining the top of a large fence really made the area feel homey.
Ready to turn around, I looked at the wall in front of us and was suddenly immobilized. Bridget and Liz watched as I crouched down on all fours, laughing so hard that there was no actual sound coming out of my mouth. Unable to speak in full sentences, I only managed to raise my hand and point to the wall. “Gra-ffitti,” I gasped. “Gra-ffitti.” I was dangerously close to peeing my pants and waited for my friends to make the connection. Looking around, they finally saw it. Scrawled on the concentration camp wall in front of us in bright spray paint was “Cabbage Lane.”
How, I thought, could we have possibly missed such a clear street sign? Silly Americans! I tried to collect myself and stood up slowly, checking to see if any pee had soaked through my jeans. Following the graffiti, we walked a few steps further and there it was, our potential home!
“Maybe it’s not as bad in the inside,” I said, as various scenarios ran through my head.
What would I tell my friends when they came to visit? “Hook a left at the alley and make a right past the barbed wire. If you see a prostitute, you’ve gone too far. Should you run into a one-legged man named Jose, blow your rape whistle!”
I was in no mood to get raped my first week in Ireland, especially with such an early morning ahead of us, so we turned around and headed back to the hostel, willing to give Cabbage Lane the chance it deserved.
The next day we returned to Little Bosnia with a fresh perspective. This wouldn’t be so bad! Patrick, the landlord, arrived after awhile and led us through the front of the house, apologizing for the mess. “I’m just finishing painting.” The various paint cans and toxic fumes were a pretty good giveaway. Patrick explained that we would share access to the home with two other boarders who were living upstairs. He assured us we would have separate entrances. We were to use the back door, easily accessible by way of alley.
The kitchen left something to be desired, as did the family room, bathroom and three tiny bedrooms. I tried to picture coming home to this everyday and convinced myself I could be happy here. There was no room in the kitchen for any sort of table, but cable was included with rent and what could be more quaint than tv dinners next to the leaking radiator?
We told Patrick we would think about it and get back to him by the end of the day. Exiting through our special entrance in the back, Liz and I were beginning to get excited. We actually had the promise of our own place to live! And all those kitchen utensils….this was paradise!
Then Bridget spoke up. “We’re not living here,” she said. “We deserve better.”
Liz and I highlighted all the luxuries of Cabbage Lane. The security system, for one, was top-notch. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never been one to mess with barbed wire. The leisure activities in the alley were also endless. I would be celebrating my 22nd birthday in Ireland and a rousing game of pin the beer can on the backyard hobo seemed like the perfect way to ring in the new year.
“We deserve better,” Bridget repeated. “No, we deserve better. We are not living here. We deserve better.”
Liz and I both knew we couldn’t argue with her. I deserved to live in a home with a front and a back door. A home with windows.
Feeling a bit defeated, we made our way to our next appointment. This place was a little bit better, and on a legitimate street with a real street sign that didn’t originate from a spray can, but it was still way too much money for the size.
Zero for two. Walking a few blocks, we made our way to bachelorette pad number three. The place was located inside a gated community that in no way resembled a maximum security prison. Chunks of gravel and stone were replaced with lush, green grass. Special entrances with real ones. It was glorious.
We were several hours early for our appointment and decided to press our heads up against the windows to get a taste of what we were dealing with. To this day I’m not sure if the house was that incredible or if it just looked like a palace in comparison to Cabbage Lane.
The only problem was the price. It was 1200 euros a month compared to the 900 we would be spending at the penitentiary. We sat outside of the house for a good twenty minutes, contemplating our options. We finally decided to go look at the last two places and take it from there.
The next abode was listed as a “student accommodation” which really translated to “shitty accommodation that only students will find acceptable.” The house on 4 McDonough Drive was a forty minute walk from the city and my feet were already killing me. It was, in many ways, an indication of what was to come as a Tasty Sandwich Girl.
A few minutes into our trek, the rain began to fall. We knew enough to carry umbrellas everywhere we went, but mine was no match for the weather of Ireland. Bridget and Liz walked ahead in embarrassment as I pulled out my plum colored shield, the cloth covering torn away to reveal three metal rods.
The rain came harder and my umbrella continued to take a pounding. Another metal rod popped out from under the covering before the handle snapped off in my hand. Disgusted, I hurled the plastic piece to the ground, and was left holding a thin stem of metal. Bridget and Liz found my predicament quite amusing. I found nothing funny about the possibility of electrocution. Next to drowning under a ring of fire and being stabbed to death, I couldn’t think of anything worse.
Nineteen hours later we arrived at McDonough Drive, yet, once again, we could not locate the exact property. We searched and searched before calling the landlord for help.
“It’s the house with the blinds in it, 4 McDonough Drive,” Tom said. “I’m not there, I’m at a pub, but there’s a key in the rafters above the door. Let yourselves in and have a look!”
I was getting pretty fed up with Tom, yet equally intrigued by this Irish way of life. Bridget hung up and we continued our search for house number 4. Tom had failed to mention that there were three McDonough streets in this neighborhood clearly designed by an urban planning mastermind.
After another nineteen hours, we were pretty confident we had found the place. Bridget called Tom again. “Are you standing in the doorway,” he said? “Are there rafters above you? No, that’s not it.”
Had no one introduced these people to the key under the rock concept, I thought to myself! Still, we trudged along and finally found THEE 4 McDonough Drive, complete with rafters. Standing under the doorway, the three of us looked up in silence. How the HELL were we going to get these God forsaken keys down?!
“Liz is the lightest,” I finally said. “You’re going to have to climb on my back and get the keys. And Bridget…take my camera and get some pictures.”
“I’m not climbing on your back and reaching up in the rafters!” Liz exclaimed.
After finally convincing her that this was a much better idea than throwing ME on her back, she swung her legs over my shoulders as I crouched down on the pavement. Slowly rising, I hoisted her up into the air, her legs dangling around my neck. The entire situation suddenly struck me as the funniest thing I had encountered in quite some time and I snapped my legs shut in an attempt to once again keep my bladder in check. “I have to clamp it shut, Liz!” I gasped, laughing hysterically.
“LAUREN! I swear to God if you don’t stop making me laugh, I will piss on your back! I’m serious, I will piss on you!”
I knew I didn’t want any pee on my back, so I pulled myself together and steadied my shoulders. Liz moved her hands along the rafters, fumbling for any sign of a key. “It’s not here! And Jesus Christ, there are probably cockroaches up here!”
“Keep checking,” I ordered. “And Bridget…take another picture.”
Liz checked one more time before I lowered her back down to the ground and we marched ourselves back to town. Tom could drown in that pint of Guinness as far as I was concerned.
Resigning to the thought of living in an alley, I hobbled down the street with my broken umbrella and blistered feet. Our final house of the day was over an hour away on foot and I was ready to call it quits, but Bridget and Liz convinced me to give it a shot.
Walking up the hill of Laurel Park, I knew we had found home. I paid no attention to “Seamus Doolin is a child molester” scrawled on a wall at the top of the street and headed to 244 with a renewed sense of hope. Three days later we moved in and never looked back.
Our modest home on a quiet street above Galway has seen others come and go since our departure last October, but I still think of it as OURS, sent to us when we needed a tiny miracle the most. I would think of Cabbage Lane frequently during our time in 244, and imagine how different things would have been. Coming home from a hard day of sambo sales, I’d grip my fanny pack of money tightly as I made my way down the alley, past the barbed wire and into the special back entrance. Flopping down on the couch with my dinner, I would fill out paper work for my tetnus shot, all the while thinking, “this is not why I came to Ireland!” before taking comfort in the one thought I would cling to each night in my windowless bedroom…
At least it’s a good story.
There was a time not too long ago when my only goal was to get out of my hostel-turned-home in Ireland and into a place where I didn’t have to wear flip flops in the shower. A time when I yearned for the comfort of sheets free from a plethora of stains and bug eggs. A time when…well, you get the picture.
A few days into our trip, my friends and I began the search for a home of our own. We were going to be in Galway for the next five months and the hostel was no place to return after a hard day of work. How were we to know that only one of us would ever find a job anyway?
The friendly guy at the front desk of the hostel suggested we get up early on Thursday when the Galway Advertiser included its weekly housing insert. There were several ads that looked fairly promising and we bunkered down in our room that morning, armed with a cell phone, pad and paper, our hopes and dreams, and the stares of a creepy girl in an adjacent bunk who spent her days in the hostel reading behind a makeshift curtain she had constructed out of a bath towel.
With her as our inspiration, we knew we had to find another place to live.
Bridget had the best phone voice and was enlisted to make the calls. We managed to create a decent list of about five places to check out and made appointments for the following day. I had a good feeling about this.
That night we decided to get a sneak preview of our first option, just to get an idea of what we were dealing with prior to our actual appointment. Patrick’s home on Cabbage Lane sounded like a real dime piece and was just outside the city center, but as we roamed the streets with our map, we couldn’t figure out where the hell Cabbage Lane was. We passed the street before it on the map and the street after it, but there was nothing in between, save a dingy alley.
After walking back and forth for over half an hour, past the cemetery and back to the city center, we decided to take a stroll down the alley. An incredibly safe decision as the final light of day disappeared. I had never been to the Soviet Union, but I was fairly certain it had the same bombed-out flair of this alley. Large chunks of stone and brick were missing from the narrow walls and the barbed wire lining the top of a large fence really made the area feel homey.
Ready to turn around, I looked at the wall in front of us and was suddenly immobilized. Bridget and Liz watched as I crouched down on all fours, laughing so hard that there was no actual sound coming out of my mouth. Unable to speak in full sentences, I only managed to raise my hand and point to the wall. “Gra-ffitti,” I gasped. “Gra-ffitti.” I was dangerously close to peeing my pants and waited for my friends to make the connection. Looking around, they finally saw it. Scrawled on the concentration camp wall in front of us in bright spray paint was “Cabbage Lane.”
How, I thought, could we have possibly missed such a clear street sign? Silly Americans! I tried to collect myself and stood up slowly, checking to see if any pee had soaked through my jeans. Following the graffiti, we walked a few steps further and there it was, our potential home!
“Maybe it’s not as bad in the inside,” I said, as various scenarios ran through my head.
What would I tell my friends when they came to visit? “Hook a left at the alley and make a right past the barbed wire. If you see a prostitute, you’ve gone too far. Should you run into a one-legged man named Jose, blow your rape whistle!”
I was in no mood to get raped my first week in Ireland, especially with such an early morning ahead of us, so we turned around and headed back to the hostel, willing to give Cabbage Lane the chance it deserved.
The next day we returned to Little Bosnia with a fresh perspective. This wouldn’t be so bad! Patrick, the landlord, arrived after awhile and led us through the front of the house, apologizing for the mess. “I’m just finishing painting.” The various paint cans and toxic fumes were a pretty good giveaway. Patrick explained that we would share access to the home with two other boarders who were living upstairs. He assured us we would have separate entrances. We were to use the back door, easily accessible by way of alley.
The kitchen left something to be desired, as did the family room, bathroom and three tiny bedrooms. I tried to picture coming home to this everyday and convinced myself I could be happy here. There was no room in the kitchen for any sort of table, but cable was included with rent and what could be more quaint than tv dinners next to the leaking radiator?
We told Patrick we would think about it and get back to him by the end of the day. Exiting through our special entrance in the back, Liz and I were beginning to get excited. We actually had the promise of our own place to live! And all those kitchen utensils….this was paradise!
Then Bridget spoke up. “We’re not living here,” she said. “We deserve better.”
Liz and I highlighted all the luxuries of Cabbage Lane. The security system, for one, was top-notch. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never been one to mess with barbed wire. The leisure activities in the alley were also endless. I would be celebrating my 22nd birthday in Ireland and a rousing game of pin the beer can on the backyard hobo seemed like the perfect way to ring in the new year.
“We deserve better,” Bridget repeated. “No, we deserve better. We are not living here. We deserve better.”
Liz and I both knew we couldn’t argue with her. I deserved to live in a home with a front and a back door. A home with windows.
Feeling a bit defeated, we made our way to our next appointment. This place was a little bit better, and on a legitimate street with a real street sign that didn’t originate from a spray can, but it was still way too much money for the size.
Zero for two. Walking a few blocks, we made our way to bachelorette pad number three. The place was located inside a gated community that in no way resembled a maximum security prison. Chunks of gravel and stone were replaced with lush, green grass. Special entrances with real ones. It was glorious.
We were several hours early for our appointment and decided to press our heads up against the windows to get a taste of what we were dealing with. To this day I’m not sure if the house was that incredible or if it just looked like a palace in comparison to Cabbage Lane.
The only problem was the price. It was 1200 euros a month compared to the 900 we would be spending at the penitentiary. We sat outside of the house for a good twenty minutes, contemplating our options. We finally decided to go look at the last two places and take it from there.
The next abode was listed as a “student accommodation” which really translated to “shitty accommodation that only students will find acceptable.” The house on 4 McDonough Drive was a forty minute walk from the city and my feet were already killing me. It was, in many ways, an indication of what was to come as a Tasty Sandwich Girl.
A few minutes into our trek, the rain began to fall. We knew enough to carry umbrellas everywhere we went, but mine was no match for the weather of Ireland. Bridget and Liz walked ahead in embarrassment as I pulled out my plum colored shield, the cloth covering torn away to reveal three metal rods.
The rain came harder and my umbrella continued to take a pounding. Another metal rod popped out from under the covering before the handle snapped off in my hand. Disgusted, I hurled the plastic piece to the ground, and was left holding a thin stem of metal. Bridget and Liz found my predicament quite amusing. I found nothing funny about the possibility of electrocution. Next to drowning under a ring of fire and being stabbed to death, I couldn’t think of anything worse.
Nineteen hours later we arrived at McDonough Drive, yet, once again, we could not locate the exact property. We searched and searched before calling the landlord for help.
“It’s the house with the blinds in it, 4 McDonough Drive,” Tom said. “I’m not there, I’m at a pub, but there’s a key in the rafters above the door. Let yourselves in and have a look!”
I was getting pretty fed up with Tom, yet equally intrigued by this Irish way of life. Bridget hung up and we continued our search for house number 4. Tom had failed to mention that there were three McDonough streets in this neighborhood clearly designed by an urban planning mastermind.
After another nineteen hours, we were pretty confident we had found the place. Bridget called Tom again. “Are you standing in the doorway,” he said? “Are there rafters above you? No, that’s not it.”
Had no one introduced these people to the key under the rock concept, I thought to myself! Still, we trudged along and finally found THEE 4 McDonough Drive, complete with rafters. Standing under the doorway, the three of us looked up in silence. How the HELL were we going to get these God forsaken keys down?!
“Liz is the lightest,” I finally said. “You’re going to have to climb on my back and get the keys. And Bridget…take my camera and get some pictures.”
“I’m not climbing on your back and reaching up in the rafters!” Liz exclaimed.
After finally convincing her that this was a much better idea than throwing ME on her back, she swung her legs over my shoulders as I crouched down on the pavement. Slowly rising, I hoisted her up into the air, her legs dangling around my neck. The entire situation suddenly struck me as the funniest thing I had encountered in quite some time and I snapped my legs shut in an attempt to once again keep my bladder in check. “I have to clamp it shut, Liz!” I gasped, laughing hysterically.
“LAUREN! I swear to God if you don’t stop making me laugh, I will piss on your back! I’m serious, I will piss on you!”
I knew I didn’t want any pee on my back, so I pulled myself together and steadied my shoulders. Liz moved her hands along the rafters, fumbling for any sign of a key. “It’s not here! And Jesus Christ, there are probably cockroaches up here!”
“Keep checking,” I ordered. “And Bridget…take another picture.”
Liz checked one more time before I lowered her back down to the ground and we marched ourselves back to town. Tom could drown in that pint of Guinness as far as I was concerned.
Resigning to the thought of living in an alley, I hobbled down the street with my broken umbrella and blistered feet. Our final house of the day was over an hour away on foot and I was ready to call it quits, but Bridget and Liz convinced me to give it a shot.
Walking up the hill of Laurel Park, I knew we had found home. I paid no attention to “Seamus Doolin is a child molester” scrawled on a wall at the top of the street and headed to 244 with a renewed sense of hope. Three days later we moved in and never looked back.
Our modest home on a quiet street above Galway has seen others come and go since our departure last October, but I still think of it as OURS, sent to us when we needed a tiny miracle the most. I would think of Cabbage Lane frequently during our time in 244, and imagine how different things would have been. Coming home from a hard day of sambo sales, I’d grip my fanny pack of money tightly as I made my way down the alley, past the barbed wire and into the special back entrance. Flopping down on the couch with my dinner, I would fill out paper work for my tetnus shot, all the while thinking, “this is not why I came to Ireland!” before taking comfort in the one thought I would cling to each night in my windowless bedroom…
At least it’s a good story.
Sunday, August 9, 2009
To Thaw or Not To Thaw? That Is The Question.
God gave me a generous amount of gifts. Cooking skills were not included.
To watch me in the kitchen would feel much like watching a dyslexic child attempt to read “Bleak House” by Charles Dickens. It’s awkward and painful to witness, and you want to offer your help without hurting their feelings.
The constant joke at the lunch table in work, I decided last night to cook a real, adult meal for the week. In the past, I’ve been known to bring in delectable dishes including, but not limited to: tuna (with no mayonnaise or bread), chicken nuggets with shredded cheese and spaghetti sauce incased in tortilla wraps that are stale and immediately break open after your first bite, perfectly cut pieces of ham steak that some co-workers have likened to food “fit for a farm animal,” and the ever popular peanut butter and jelly.
With the belittling comments and taunting in mind, I was determined to make something I could really be proud of. Chicken Korma over rice seemed like just the right dish.
Perfect, I thought. I already had chicken in the freezer and wouldn’t even need to go grocery shopping. In actuality, I didn’t need to go grocery shopping for quite some time, since I had snatched up a giant package of boneless chicken breasts two weeks prior when they were on sale.
Actually, I had gotten everything on sale that week. In both looks and personality, I am my mother’s daughter. And part of that package includes grocery shopping as if you were on food stamps. If it’s not on sale, don’t buy it. This montra was programmed into my brain from a young age. “But I really want a Lunchable, mom!” I would exclaim in the grocery store. “They’re not on sale and we have turkey and cheese at home,” she would reply. Guess what… Lunchables are never on sale. Which means we never got them. To this day, I find something wildly appealing about those overpriced slices of meat in their tiny triangular sections, next to a single Reese’s cup and three crackers.
Lugging my $1.79 per pound chicken breasts out of the freezer with my dear mother in mind, I suddenly realized I had a problem. In the past, I immediately cooked two or three chicken breasts upon purchase, wrapping the other ones individually in tin foil and then putting them in a zip lock baggie in the freezer. This time, though, I put the entire package in the freezer before separating any of the breasts, which was problematic considering I only wanted to cook a few of them this week. I’m no Emeril, but I know you aren’t supposed to thaw a frozen item, only to re-freeze it again later. To be perfectly honest, I have no idea why this is bad. In my mind, to do such a thing would ensure the onset of salmonella, but perhaps the consequences are less severe. Still, I didn’t want to find out.
Staring at the huge block of chicken that had frozen into one large, raw rectangle of former feathers and beaks, I tried to conjure the spirit of Julia Child. How would she separate the chicken? Brute force, perhaps? But my bare hands had proven ineffective. The next logical tool seemed to be the Scream knife sitting in the sink. I wasn’t sure what my roommate had used this murder weapon for but I was pretty certain it had killed multiple animals at a cattle ranch in Texas before landing in our cutlery drawer. This would cut through frozen chicken with ease.
After a few wild stabs, I had gotten nowhere with the chicken. I started sawing at a feverish pace while trying to imagine what a 12” blade would feel like ripping through my flesh. In second grade, my teacher Mrs. Anderson had to leave class early once after her son cut his hand on a knife while separating a bagel. I’ve been wary of blades ever since.
Five minutes into my hacking, the only real thing I had cut through was the Styrofoam packaging at the bottom. Things were going downhill rather quickly and decisions had to be made. Water and rice were spilling over the edges of the pot on the stove as I stood by the counter frozen, contemplating my options. I could only focus on one problem at a time. The rice would have to wait.
Questioning whether or not I had accumulated enough sick days to battle a food-born illness, I made the executive decision to put the chicken in the refrigerator. I would de-thaw it just enough to break through it with a knife and separate a few breasts. The rest would be neatly wrapped and placed back in the freezer with a prayer and a zip lock bag.
I was fairly confident with my decision and moved back over to the stove to get the rice under control. Simple things on the stove have always been a challenge for me. I still remember asking my mother at the age of 14 how to boil water. She was deeply distressed by my question, to which I responded, “Well how would I know! Nobody ever told me how!” I’m not sure why this was of particular concern to her considering my 20 year old brother still doesn’t understand which months make up each of the four seasons.
Once I learned how to boil water, I also learned that the stove is a fickle beast. A beast who mocks me at every turn. Surely I can’t be blamed for the green mashed potato incident of 2007, or the blackened rice I served to guests in Ireland, only after announcing, “Those black things in there aren’t pepper…that’s burned bits.”
Still, nothing quite compares to the kitchen disaster of 1997 (the same year, you may recall, that I shit my pants). Instructed to give a “how to” presentation of my choosing for my English class, I had decided to have my mother videotape me making peanut butter cookies. With the acting ability of a grasshopper, I continued to fumble on take after take. To make matters worse, my mom had suddenly become a stage mother akin to Patty Ramsey and was forcing me to play up all of my actions, at one point directing me to dramatically smell the cookie sheet before giving a thumbs up and making an “ahhhh” sound. With all of these theatrics, we had been at this thing for hours. “This has to be the last take,” my mother had finally said. “We’re running out of battery.”
With that in mind, I walked over to the counter and prepared to crack an egg into the mixing bowl. Too caught up in how my ginormous glasses and greasy ponytail would translate on film, I paid little attention as I cracked the egg, which splattered all over both the counter and my green, oversized Nike t-shirt. Looking back at the camera, all I could think to say was “….mom….” We didn’t have enough film to tape over the incident and as a result, 30 of my classmates were able to get a good laugh at my expense.
My sordid history with eggs and rice in mind, chicken breasts had seemed like a safe alternative. And now here I was, perched on a kitchen chair, wondering if I had destroyed yet another meal. I waited a few more minutes and then removed the chicken from the refrigerator for stabbing attempt number two.
This time the chicken separated fairly easily and with a silent Hail Mary, I put the meat on a baking sheet and slid it into the oven.
I’m happy to report that the chicken turned out just fine! I’m pretty sure there are remnants of raw chicken meat and juice on 80% of the kitchen counter space, in addition to some select door knobs throughout the rest of the apartment, but the important thing is that I averted a crisis.
And if tomorrow I am suddenly sent to the hospital with a terrible case of salmonella, I’ll remember to smile while puking my guts out.
At least it’s a good story.
To watch me in the kitchen would feel much like watching a dyslexic child attempt to read “Bleak House” by Charles Dickens. It’s awkward and painful to witness, and you want to offer your help without hurting their feelings.
The constant joke at the lunch table in work, I decided last night to cook a real, adult meal for the week. In the past, I’ve been known to bring in delectable dishes including, but not limited to: tuna (with no mayonnaise or bread), chicken nuggets with shredded cheese and spaghetti sauce incased in tortilla wraps that are stale and immediately break open after your first bite, perfectly cut pieces of ham steak that some co-workers have likened to food “fit for a farm animal,” and the ever popular peanut butter and jelly.
With the belittling comments and taunting in mind, I was determined to make something I could really be proud of. Chicken Korma over rice seemed like just the right dish.
Perfect, I thought. I already had chicken in the freezer and wouldn’t even need to go grocery shopping. In actuality, I didn’t need to go grocery shopping for quite some time, since I had snatched up a giant package of boneless chicken breasts two weeks prior when they were on sale.
Actually, I had gotten everything on sale that week. In both looks and personality, I am my mother’s daughter. And part of that package includes grocery shopping as if you were on food stamps. If it’s not on sale, don’t buy it. This montra was programmed into my brain from a young age. “But I really want a Lunchable, mom!” I would exclaim in the grocery store. “They’re not on sale and we have turkey and cheese at home,” she would reply. Guess what… Lunchables are never on sale. Which means we never got them. To this day, I find something wildly appealing about those overpriced slices of meat in their tiny triangular sections, next to a single Reese’s cup and three crackers.
Lugging my $1.79 per pound chicken breasts out of the freezer with my dear mother in mind, I suddenly realized I had a problem. In the past, I immediately cooked two or three chicken breasts upon purchase, wrapping the other ones individually in tin foil and then putting them in a zip lock baggie in the freezer. This time, though, I put the entire package in the freezer before separating any of the breasts, which was problematic considering I only wanted to cook a few of them this week. I’m no Emeril, but I know you aren’t supposed to thaw a frozen item, only to re-freeze it again later. To be perfectly honest, I have no idea why this is bad. In my mind, to do such a thing would ensure the onset of salmonella, but perhaps the consequences are less severe. Still, I didn’t want to find out.
Staring at the huge block of chicken that had frozen into one large, raw rectangle of former feathers and beaks, I tried to conjure the spirit of Julia Child. How would she separate the chicken? Brute force, perhaps? But my bare hands had proven ineffective. The next logical tool seemed to be the Scream knife sitting in the sink. I wasn’t sure what my roommate had used this murder weapon for but I was pretty certain it had killed multiple animals at a cattle ranch in Texas before landing in our cutlery drawer. This would cut through frozen chicken with ease.
After a few wild stabs, I had gotten nowhere with the chicken. I started sawing at a feverish pace while trying to imagine what a 12” blade would feel like ripping through my flesh. In second grade, my teacher Mrs. Anderson had to leave class early once after her son cut his hand on a knife while separating a bagel. I’ve been wary of blades ever since.
Five minutes into my hacking, the only real thing I had cut through was the Styrofoam packaging at the bottom. Things were going downhill rather quickly and decisions had to be made. Water and rice were spilling over the edges of the pot on the stove as I stood by the counter frozen, contemplating my options. I could only focus on one problem at a time. The rice would have to wait.
Questioning whether or not I had accumulated enough sick days to battle a food-born illness, I made the executive decision to put the chicken in the refrigerator. I would de-thaw it just enough to break through it with a knife and separate a few breasts. The rest would be neatly wrapped and placed back in the freezer with a prayer and a zip lock bag.
I was fairly confident with my decision and moved back over to the stove to get the rice under control. Simple things on the stove have always been a challenge for me. I still remember asking my mother at the age of 14 how to boil water. She was deeply distressed by my question, to which I responded, “Well how would I know! Nobody ever told me how!” I’m not sure why this was of particular concern to her considering my 20 year old brother still doesn’t understand which months make up each of the four seasons.
Once I learned how to boil water, I also learned that the stove is a fickle beast. A beast who mocks me at every turn. Surely I can’t be blamed for the green mashed potato incident of 2007, or the blackened rice I served to guests in Ireland, only after announcing, “Those black things in there aren’t pepper…that’s burned bits.”
Still, nothing quite compares to the kitchen disaster of 1997 (the same year, you may recall, that I shit my pants). Instructed to give a “how to” presentation of my choosing for my English class, I had decided to have my mother videotape me making peanut butter cookies. With the acting ability of a grasshopper, I continued to fumble on take after take. To make matters worse, my mom had suddenly become a stage mother akin to Patty Ramsey and was forcing me to play up all of my actions, at one point directing me to dramatically smell the cookie sheet before giving a thumbs up and making an “ahhhh” sound. With all of these theatrics, we had been at this thing for hours. “This has to be the last take,” my mother had finally said. “We’re running out of battery.”
With that in mind, I walked over to the counter and prepared to crack an egg into the mixing bowl. Too caught up in how my ginormous glasses and greasy ponytail would translate on film, I paid little attention as I cracked the egg, which splattered all over both the counter and my green, oversized Nike t-shirt. Looking back at the camera, all I could think to say was “….mom….” We didn’t have enough film to tape over the incident and as a result, 30 of my classmates were able to get a good laugh at my expense.
My sordid history with eggs and rice in mind, chicken breasts had seemed like a safe alternative. And now here I was, perched on a kitchen chair, wondering if I had destroyed yet another meal. I waited a few more minutes and then removed the chicken from the refrigerator for stabbing attempt number two.
This time the chicken separated fairly easily and with a silent Hail Mary, I put the meat on a baking sheet and slid it into the oven.
I’m happy to report that the chicken turned out just fine! I’m pretty sure there are remnants of raw chicken meat and juice on 80% of the kitchen counter space, in addition to some select door knobs throughout the rest of the apartment, but the important thing is that I averted a crisis.
And if tomorrow I am suddenly sent to the hospital with a terrible case of salmonella, I’ll remember to smile while puking my guts out.
At least it’s a good story.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
I Took A Dump In A Movie Theater Once...
Listening to a David Sedaris book on tape this morning, I knew my love for him had only grown stronger. I had the privilege of meeting Dave (let's pretend we're on a first name basis) about a month ago at a local book signing. Run down with a case of laryngitis, Dave came up to the podium and explained that he wanted to save his voice for the reading. "So when you come up to get your book signed, I want you to tell me a story about breast milk or shitting your pants," he said.
I could barely contain my excitement at this announcement. I knew very little about breast milk, and hope to keep it that way for several years, but as luck would have it, I had a perfect shit-in-pants story.
I'd like to begin by stating that I usually have very ordinary bathroom experiences. Mundane, even. That being said, I, Lauren B., have shit in my pants.
Vacationing in Deep Creek, MD with my family at the tender age of eleven, my younger brother and I decided to go see Jungle 2 Jungle at the movie theater. I wasn't feeling particularly well that afternoon, but the movie trailers hinted at the possibility of young love. Ever the hopeless romantic, this was enough for me to get out of bed.
My parents dropped us off at the theater and went a few doors down to see The Mirror Has Two Faces starring Babs Streisand. Fifteen minutes into Jungle 2 Jungle, something just didn't feel right. Pushing away some stomach troubles, I tried to focus on the masterpiece unfolding. But God had other plans for me that day.
Halfway through the film, I came to the sudden realization that I had to immediately find a bathroom. I jumped up in my seat, ready to make a mad dash to the restroom. But it was too late. A once dignified and respectable young woman, I had just become the girl who shit her pants in a movie theater.
My face a mix of horror, disbelief and some slight cramping, I told my brother to get my mom and ran to the bathroom in tears. Lucikly, the load in my pants was self-contained. It was bad enough that I had to miss precious moments of Jungle 2 Jungle, but the thought of some hazmat crew shutting down the theater to clean up after me would have been too much to take.
Hiding in one of the bathroom stalls, I cried quietly until my mom came in. "Hand me your underwear," she said.
To this day, I'm deeply disturbed and apologetic to the general public for the events that followed. Handing over my Hanes, I watched in disgust as my mother washed them in the bathroom sink. The same bathroom sink where innocent, naive moviegoers would wash their hands for years to come. Some of them may have even contracted hepatitis or some other terrible, feces-transmitted disease, though I'll never know for sure.
After a few minutes of scrubbing and soaking, my mother shook her head. "I can't save them, Lauren. It's not worth it." She balled them up and tossed them into the trashcan. "You're just going to have to wear your pants until we get home."
Still crying, I followed my mom into the lobby, where my brother and father were waiting. Climbing into the van, I was forced to sit on a plastic Food Lion grocery bag. "Just in case you have another accident," my mom said.
Later that summer, I shit my pants again while taking a leisurely stroll around my neighborhood. I thought running would get me to the bathroom faster. Turns out the gravity only sped up the process. Once again, it was too late. 1997 was not kind to me.
Relaying this information to David Sedaris, I stood there anxiously awaiting his repsonse. "Wow," he finally whispered, his voice raspy and strained. "That's....embarrassing." He looked more disturbed than amused and I quickly grabbed my book and moved through the line.
I haven't shit my pants since the summer of 1997. I haven't watched Jungle 2 Jungle in its entirety, either. Perhaps I will rent the Disney flic this weekend, if only to see whether or not those two crazy kids hooked up at the end.
And if I once again shit my pants, this time as a full-fledged adult, on a sofa that doesn't belong to me, I'll take it in stride.
At least it's a good story.
I could barely contain my excitement at this announcement. I knew very little about breast milk, and hope to keep it that way for several years, but as luck would have it, I had a perfect shit-in-pants story.
I'd like to begin by stating that I usually have very ordinary bathroom experiences. Mundane, even. That being said, I, Lauren B., have shit in my pants.
Vacationing in Deep Creek, MD with my family at the tender age of eleven, my younger brother and I decided to go see Jungle 2 Jungle at the movie theater. I wasn't feeling particularly well that afternoon, but the movie trailers hinted at the possibility of young love. Ever the hopeless romantic, this was enough for me to get out of bed.
My parents dropped us off at the theater and went a few doors down to see The Mirror Has Two Faces starring Babs Streisand. Fifteen minutes into Jungle 2 Jungle, something just didn't feel right. Pushing away some stomach troubles, I tried to focus on the masterpiece unfolding. But God had other plans for me that day.
Halfway through the film, I came to the sudden realization that I had to immediately find a bathroom. I jumped up in my seat, ready to make a mad dash to the restroom. But it was too late. A once dignified and respectable young woman, I had just become the girl who shit her pants in a movie theater.
My face a mix of horror, disbelief and some slight cramping, I told my brother to get my mom and ran to the bathroom in tears. Lucikly, the load in my pants was self-contained. It was bad enough that I had to miss precious moments of Jungle 2 Jungle, but the thought of some hazmat crew shutting down the theater to clean up after me would have been too much to take.
Hiding in one of the bathroom stalls, I cried quietly until my mom came in. "Hand me your underwear," she said.
To this day, I'm deeply disturbed and apologetic to the general public for the events that followed. Handing over my Hanes, I watched in disgust as my mother washed them in the bathroom sink. The same bathroom sink where innocent, naive moviegoers would wash their hands for years to come. Some of them may have even contracted hepatitis or some other terrible, feces-transmitted disease, though I'll never know for sure.
After a few minutes of scrubbing and soaking, my mother shook her head. "I can't save them, Lauren. It's not worth it." She balled them up and tossed them into the trashcan. "You're just going to have to wear your pants until we get home."
Still crying, I followed my mom into the lobby, where my brother and father were waiting. Climbing into the van, I was forced to sit on a plastic Food Lion grocery bag. "Just in case you have another accident," my mom said.
Later that summer, I shit my pants again while taking a leisurely stroll around my neighborhood. I thought running would get me to the bathroom faster. Turns out the gravity only sped up the process. Once again, it was too late. 1997 was not kind to me.
Relaying this information to David Sedaris, I stood there anxiously awaiting his repsonse. "Wow," he finally whispered, his voice raspy and strained. "That's....embarrassing." He looked more disturbed than amused and I quickly grabbed my book and moved through the line.
I haven't shit my pants since the summer of 1997. I haven't watched Jungle 2 Jungle in its entirety, either. Perhaps I will rent the Disney flic this weekend, if only to see whether or not those two crazy kids hooked up at the end.
And if I once again shit my pants, this time as a full-fledged adult, on a sofa that doesn't belong to me, I'll take it in stride.
At least it's a good story.
Friday, August 7, 2009
I Want Him To See It...But Not Really
Watching a trailer for The Time Traveler’s Wife today, I once again craved a stable relationship. In actuality, there would be nothing stable about waiting around for Eric Bana to come in and out of your life. He would conveniently miss your daugther’s birthday on the pretense that he can’t control his travels, when that woman’s intuition Oprah always speaks of really tells you he was on another golf trip with the boys. But still, a nice thought.
At this point, I would take a handsome (if often absent) boyfriend over the gems I’ve been lucky enough to encounter since elementary school. Much like the battlefield Pat Benatar describes, my love life has been fairly gruesome. Young, heartache to heartache, I’ve stood. No promises or demands.
In fifth grade, I had a huge crush on a boy I was (wrongly) convinced felt the same way. This, I soon learned, would become the theme of my life. Rather than telling said boy directly, I decided it would be more appropriate to write “I heart E.D” (I don’t want to use people’s names here, so I’ll go with initials. And no, E.D does not stand for Erectile Dysfunction. Although maybe he later developed that, I don’t know) on the rubber part at the bottom of my shoes. I found this to be equally subtle and dramatic. I wanted people to see it, but not really. The real shocker came when E.D’s friend saw the writing on the wall...or rather, my shoe, and told a bunch of people in class about it. Horrified, I ran to the bathroom and scrubbed feverishly before scribbling over the confession with a black pen.
I learned a lot from that incident and kept the public proclamations of love to a minimum in those next few years. I really wanted to marry my cousin, who was two months older than me and a real treat to be around, but I had the foresight to realize our children would most likely be born retarded. Instead, I settled on my male best friend. In eighth grade I moved on to a boy with incredibly greasy hair who became the center of my universe for no apparent reason. I was fairly certain Lonestar had written “Amazed” that year just for the two of us. Faith Hill must have also gotten the memo when she wrote “Breathe.” Both ballads spoke to my love for B.B. By the end of eighth grade, I knew I had to make my move. Walking to the bus on the last day of school, a friend confessed that she, too, liked him. In a moment of pure panic, I decided to grab life by the balls and go for it. And when I say grab life by the balls, I mean force my good friend to track B.B. down on his respective bus and let him know that I was ready for this relationship to begin. Real shocker…he did not agree.
My four years in high school produced no real romantic prospects either, save a creepy boy I met on a cruise to Canada who wore Corona swim trunks and told me to meet him by the basketball courts one night. I said okay, followed by “but if I don’t meet you, it’s because my parents wanted to do something with me instead.” I’ve never been one to hurt anyone’s feelings. I spent the remaining days of the cruise trying to avoid Corona boy, which was especially difficult considering he just so happened to be staying in the room next to mine.
Freshman year in college I figured it was time to try some new methods. My school was sponsoring a Speed Dating night to help raise money for the ultimate Frisbee team. With nothing left to lose (or so I thought), I skipped on down to the event, only to realize I had arrived 15 minutes early. This in no way made me feel like a loser.
The only other person there early was a guy with the tiniest human ears I’ve ever seen in my life. This was especially bizarre because he was a pretty stocky guy otherwise and at least 6’3”. He wasn’t adverse looking though and we talked briefly before the actual event began. Meeting the others, I became particularly frustrated when one guy told me his girlfriend also liked the Orioles. GIRLFRIEND? Turns out he was only there because not enough guys had signed up and they weren’t about to force two women to become lesbians. “By the way,” he said, “you interested in playing Frisbee?”
At the end of the night, the guy with tiny ears asked for my screename and I was thrilled. He was almost 24 and still in college and still living with his parents but he was interested, and that was good enough. For the next week we talked on AIM, but I was plagued by one question. Just HOW tiny were his ears? I felt like I needed another look at him in the daylight. Naturally, I went onto Facebook and pieced together his class schedule. (He had no pictures on his account, which should have been a red flag right there). The next day I hid behind a giant magnolia tree outside of the history building, waiting for him to leave his American studies class. Getting another good look, it was pretty clear his father must have been a tiny mouse. Still, who was I to judge someone? I wasn’t winning any America’s Next Top Model contracts. Ears aside, our contact fizzled shortly after that. Call me crazy, but discovering lyrics on a guy’s profile that call for a bitch to suck one’s dick are a bit of a turn-off.
Sophomore year I really thought my luck had turned around when I met a guy who seemed perfect in every way. Deep dimples, tall, a love for children and basketball…this was it. He was also 27, back in college for the third time, and about to serve a week in jail for some DUI troubles. Actually, this would be his second time there. But does it really count when you spend one night in jail for gently beating up a bouncer? I think not. In all seriousness, this guy genuinely seemed to be a changed person and to this day I stand by my choice to go out with him. Frankly, I was sorry our one date never turned into anything more. Call me crazy, but he was one of the nicest guys I ever met. But alas, he was not my Romeo.
That summer I sold my soul to the retail devil and became a reluctant Target team member. Despite the cons (morning chants and the responsibility of stacking the tampon boxes just so), the job seemed like a great way to meet some guys. Volume was my strategy and the new faces I was sure to meet everyday had to translate into a love connection. Sure enough, a week or so later a fellow team member asked me out. A wannabe singer/songwriter with a tattoo, there was something about this guy that I was really attracted to. On our first (and only) date he took me to a place on the water to watch the fireworks for the 4th of July. Prior to his arrival, my mom made chocolate covered strawberries for us. I tried to explain just how incredibly awkward that would be and refused to take them. Instead, I ate them all myself moments before he arrived, rushing to get the seeds out of my teeth before he knocked on the door.
The ride to the fireworks felt slightly awkward, probably because I was ready to throw up. He was nice enough but I already felt like I wasn’t into it. Claiming our spots on the lawn once we got to the water, he inched his chair closer and closer to mine while explaining his tattoos. I quickly decided I wanted this night to end. It wasn’t his fault, really. It was his fault, however, when he put his arm around me, pointed to a family full of children in front of us and said, “we’re going to have four, right.” Wrong. I was also alarmed when he announced we would have to come back next year. Suddenly we were dating for a year? This was moving too fast for me.
We spent the next hour in the car waiting for all the traffic to die down while listening to Dane Cook talking about getting his first blow job in…a car. I wanted to be dead. That night I sent him a text explaining I would prefer to just be friends. It was a bit rushed but I was very uncomfortable with this whole dating world. He continued to contact me bi-annually for the next two years. It’s a real shame, too. Thanks to my awkwardness and his open mic appearances, I can no longer frequent my favorite coffee house on Friday nights.
The remainder of my college years were nothing more than crushes gone nowhere and one very unfortunate run-in at a local bar with a man I affectionately call Cutter. I call him this because his myspace page included multiple pictures of razor blades and an assortment or very disturbing poems. I’m not sure what is was that moved me to dance with him that night. Maybe it was his regal entrance into the pub, his right arm bleeding profusely. After getting a towel from the bartender and cleaning up, he explained that some guy had called him a faggot. In response, he bashed in the guy’s windshield with his elbow. Naturally. After stalking his myspace the next day, I also learned he had a possible drug addiction and a dead baby. And also a girlfriend. I did not return his texts.
After graduation, I worked for several months at a local pizzeria, where I met a very sweet guy named D. (I can't recall his last name). D asked me out my second day on the job and we hung out less than a handful of times. Like my old flame at Target, D was a very nice guy who treated me really well, but there was no chemistry. He was about half an inch shorter than me, which as it turns out, I have a problem with. Things got worse when he took me bowling and asked for size 9 shoes. I had to ask for a 10. This was more my problem than his, but I had to end things. (It didn't help that I was also very much in love with an illegal Mexican immigrant who worked in the back kitchen and made me roses out of tinfoil). Determined to cut it off that night as D. drove me home, I was just about to say something when he reached in the back seat and pulled out a giant bouquet of flowers. I then became the bitch who broke up with him in the driveway, flowers in hand.
Clearly the United States was no place for me to find love, which is 30 percent of the reason why I moved to Ireland for five months. Okay, more like 60 percent. While there I met a strapping Irishman who lived in Dublin. We hit it off that first night and began writing to each other every day for a month. He came back to visit several weeks later, only to ditch me the next day, later claiming his phone died. Apparently no one in Galway had a phone charger he could borrow and his legs were broken, which prevented him from walking to the internet café.
My most recent shot at love came this past winter when a friend set me up with her boyfriend’s buddy. One night I went over to this apartment for dinner and was pleasantly surprised to hear he was making pancakes. Everyone else found this incredibly cheap but what can I say, I love pancakes. After asking if I could use his bathroom, he said, “let me grab that measuring cup out of there first, I need it for the pancakes.” To this day, a lot of questions still plague me, the top three being: 1) what was the measuring cup doing in the bathroom? 2)why did i still eat the pancakes and 3) why didn’t I immediately leave?
Recognizing my love for softball, he also told me he’d take me to the batting cages, explaining they were only open on Thursdays. I later discovered the batting cages were open every day of the week. Thursday, it turns out, was the only day his roommate worked there, and therefore the only day he could get free tokens. This may come as a shock to you, but we are no longer together.
As I sit here now, I can tell you that my latest man of the hour has a girlfriend and is therefore off limits. Perhaps there will come a day when he realizes I am far better for him than she ever was and we’ll begin dating. Or maybe I’ll just decide to write his name on my forehead. I’ll want people to see it, but not really. When he inevitably notices, I’ll spend the next three hours in the bathroom crying and rubbing my skin raw.
Oh well. At least it’s a good story.
At this point, I would take a handsome (if often absent) boyfriend over the gems I’ve been lucky enough to encounter since elementary school. Much like the battlefield Pat Benatar describes, my love life has been fairly gruesome. Young, heartache to heartache, I’ve stood. No promises or demands.
In fifth grade, I had a huge crush on a boy I was (wrongly) convinced felt the same way. This, I soon learned, would become the theme of my life. Rather than telling said boy directly, I decided it would be more appropriate to write “I heart E.D” (I don’t want to use people’s names here, so I’ll go with initials. And no, E.D does not stand for Erectile Dysfunction. Although maybe he later developed that, I don’t know) on the rubber part at the bottom of my shoes. I found this to be equally subtle and dramatic. I wanted people to see it, but not really. The real shocker came when E.D’s friend saw the writing on the wall...or rather, my shoe, and told a bunch of people in class about it. Horrified, I ran to the bathroom and scrubbed feverishly before scribbling over the confession with a black pen.
I learned a lot from that incident and kept the public proclamations of love to a minimum in those next few years. I really wanted to marry my cousin, who was two months older than me and a real treat to be around, but I had the foresight to realize our children would most likely be born retarded. Instead, I settled on my male best friend. In eighth grade I moved on to a boy with incredibly greasy hair who became the center of my universe for no apparent reason. I was fairly certain Lonestar had written “Amazed” that year just for the two of us. Faith Hill must have also gotten the memo when she wrote “Breathe.” Both ballads spoke to my love for B.B. By the end of eighth grade, I knew I had to make my move. Walking to the bus on the last day of school, a friend confessed that she, too, liked him. In a moment of pure panic, I decided to grab life by the balls and go for it. And when I say grab life by the balls, I mean force my good friend to track B.B. down on his respective bus and let him know that I was ready for this relationship to begin. Real shocker…he did not agree.
My four years in high school produced no real romantic prospects either, save a creepy boy I met on a cruise to Canada who wore Corona swim trunks and told me to meet him by the basketball courts one night. I said okay, followed by “but if I don’t meet you, it’s because my parents wanted to do something with me instead.” I’ve never been one to hurt anyone’s feelings. I spent the remaining days of the cruise trying to avoid Corona boy, which was especially difficult considering he just so happened to be staying in the room next to mine.
Freshman year in college I figured it was time to try some new methods. My school was sponsoring a Speed Dating night to help raise money for the ultimate Frisbee team. With nothing left to lose (or so I thought), I skipped on down to the event, only to realize I had arrived 15 minutes early. This in no way made me feel like a loser.
The only other person there early was a guy with the tiniest human ears I’ve ever seen in my life. This was especially bizarre because he was a pretty stocky guy otherwise and at least 6’3”. He wasn’t adverse looking though and we talked briefly before the actual event began. Meeting the others, I became particularly frustrated when one guy told me his girlfriend also liked the Orioles. GIRLFRIEND? Turns out he was only there because not enough guys had signed up and they weren’t about to force two women to become lesbians. “By the way,” he said, “you interested in playing Frisbee?”
At the end of the night, the guy with tiny ears asked for my screename and I was thrilled. He was almost 24 and still in college and still living with his parents but he was interested, and that was good enough. For the next week we talked on AIM, but I was plagued by one question. Just HOW tiny were his ears? I felt like I needed another look at him in the daylight. Naturally, I went onto Facebook and pieced together his class schedule. (He had no pictures on his account, which should have been a red flag right there). The next day I hid behind a giant magnolia tree outside of the history building, waiting for him to leave his American studies class. Getting another good look, it was pretty clear his father must have been a tiny mouse. Still, who was I to judge someone? I wasn’t winning any America’s Next Top Model contracts. Ears aside, our contact fizzled shortly after that. Call me crazy, but discovering lyrics on a guy’s profile that call for a bitch to suck one’s dick are a bit of a turn-off.
Sophomore year I really thought my luck had turned around when I met a guy who seemed perfect in every way. Deep dimples, tall, a love for children and basketball…this was it. He was also 27, back in college for the third time, and about to serve a week in jail for some DUI troubles. Actually, this would be his second time there. But does it really count when you spend one night in jail for gently beating up a bouncer? I think not. In all seriousness, this guy genuinely seemed to be a changed person and to this day I stand by my choice to go out with him. Frankly, I was sorry our one date never turned into anything more. Call me crazy, but he was one of the nicest guys I ever met. But alas, he was not my Romeo.
That summer I sold my soul to the retail devil and became a reluctant Target team member. Despite the cons (morning chants and the responsibility of stacking the tampon boxes just so), the job seemed like a great way to meet some guys. Volume was my strategy and the new faces I was sure to meet everyday had to translate into a love connection. Sure enough, a week or so later a fellow team member asked me out. A wannabe singer/songwriter with a tattoo, there was something about this guy that I was really attracted to. On our first (and only) date he took me to a place on the water to watch the fireworks for the 4th of July. Prior to his arrival, my mom made chocolate covered strawberries for us. I tried to explain just how incredibly awkward that would be and refused to take them. Instead, I ate them all myself moments before he arrived, rushing to get the seeds out of my teeth before he knocked on the door.
The ride to the fireworks felt slightly awkward, probably because I was ready to throw up. He was nice enough but I already felt like I wasn’t into it. Claiming our spots on the lawn once we got to the water, he inched his chair closer and closer to mine while explaining his tattoos. I quickly decided I wanted this night to end. It wasn’t his fault, really. It was his fault, however, when he put his arm around me, pointed to a family full of children in front of us and said, “we’re going to have four, right.” Wrong. I was also alarmed when he announced we would have to come back next year. Suddenly we were dating for a year? This was moving too fast for me.
We spent the next hour in the car waiting for all the traffic to die down while listening to Dane Cook talking about getting his first blow job in…a car. I wanted to be dead. That night I sent him a text explaining I would prefer to just be friends. It was a bit rushed but I was very uncomfortable with this whole dating world. He continued to contact me bi-annually for the next two years. It’s a real shame, too. Thanks to my awkwardness and his open mic appearances, I can no longer frequent my favorite coffee house on Friday nights.
The remainder of my college years were nothing more than crushes gone nowhere and one very unfortunate run-in at a local bar with a man I affectionately call Cutter. I call him this because his myspace page included multiple pictures of razor blades and an assortment or very disturbing poems. I’m not sure what is was that moved me to dance with him that night. Maybe it was his regal entrance into the pub, his right arm bleeding profusely. After getting a towel from the bartender and cleaning up, he explained that some guy had called him a faggot. In response, he bashed in the guy’s windshield with his elbow. Naturally. After stalking his myspace the next day, I also learned he had a possible drug addiction and a dead baby. And also a girlfriend. I did not return his texts.
After graduation, I worked for several months at a local pizzeria, where I met a very sweet guy named D. (I can't recall his last name). D asked me out my second day on the job and we hung out less than a handful of times. Like my old flame at Target, D was a very nice guy who treated me really well, but there was no chemistry. He was about half an inch shorter than me, which as it turns out, I have a problem with. Things got worse when he took me bowling and asked for size 9 shoes. I had to ask for a 10. This was more my problem than his, but I had to end things. (It didn't help that I was also very much in love with an illegal Mexican immigrant who worked in the back kitchen and made me roses out of tinfoil). Determined to cut it off that night as D. drove me home, I was just about to say something when he reached in the back seat and pulled out a giant bouquet of flowers. I then became the bitch who broke up with him in the driveway, flowers in hand.
Clearly the United States was no place for me to find love, which is 30 percent of the reason why I moved to Ireland for five months. Okay, more like 60 percent. While there I met a strapping Irishman who lived in Dublin. We hit it off that first night and began writing to each other every day for a month. He came back to visit several weeks later, only to ditch me the next day, later claiming his phone died. Apparently no one in Galway had a phone charger he could borrow and his legs were broken, which prevented him from walking to the internet café.
My most recent shot at love came this past winter when a friend set me up with her boyfriend’s buddy. One night I went over to this apartment for dinner and was pleasantly surprised to hear he was making pancakes. Everyone else found this incredibly cheap but what can I say, I love pancakes. After asking if I could use his bathroom, he said, “let me grab that measuring cup out of there first, I need it for the pancakes.” To this day, a lot of questions still plague me, the top three being: 1) what was the measuring cup doing in the bathroom? 2)why did i still eat the pancakes and 3) why didn’t I immediately leave?
Recognizing my love for softball, he also told me he’d take me to the batting cages, explaining they were only open on Thursdays. I later discovered the batting cages were open every day of the week. Thursday, it turns out, was the only day his roommate worked there, and therefore the only day he could get free tokens. This may come as a shock to you, but we are no longer together.
As I sit here now, I can tell you that my latest man of the hour has a girlfriend and is therefore off limits. Perhaps there will come a day when he realizes I am far better for him than she ever was and we’ll begin dating. Or maybe I’ll just decide to write his name on my forehead. I’ll want people to see it, but not really. When he inevitably notices, I’ll spend the next three hours in the bathroom crying and rubbing my skin raw.
Oh well. At least it’s a good story.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Oreos and Gushers and Cheesecake, Oh My!
I’m told the average person eats one item of food prior to lunch. Some would call this “breakfast.” Others skip said meal altogether. I, on the other hand, have managed to consume oatmeal, wheat thins, chocolate almonds and a nice slice of cheesecake all before the ripe hour of 11 a.m. Some would call this a “problem.” I prefer to think of it as a lifestyle choice that has made me quite happy from 1986 to the present.
I laugh now only because I am afforded the luxury of purchasing pants complete with a button and zipper. There was a dark period of my life, circa 1996, when I couldn’t fit into anything that didn’t involve some sort of elastic waistband. Was I obese? Technically, yes I was. “Obese” is such a negative term though and one that doesn’t seem quite fair to throw on an innocent eleven year old who enjoys indulging in a pack of gushers (or four) every afternoon while watching The Rosie O’Donnell show.
But if weighing 100 pounds at the age of 10 makes me “obese”, then fine, call me what you will. Anyone who feels satisfied after five tiny chewy candies is no friend of mine. Candies with FRUIT in the center, might I add! Nevertheless, these mid-afternoon binges were of no help to my waistline as I became increasingly similar in appearance to a chipmunk. Minus an excess of hair and a tail.
The only real ace I drew during those middle school years was a true and intense love for the Charlotte Hornets. Looking back, I think it was more of a true and intense love for their team colors, but that’s neither here nor there. Sporting team swish pants everyday for the greater part of sixth grade, buttons and zippers were no longer much of a concern. As an added bonus, the swishing sound of the incredibly flammable pants made my presence known in the halls. Free to move about in the elasticity as I pleased, I welcomed my favorite treats with open arms. Oreos, get over here! Nutter Butters, do your thang! Carrots dripping in ranch dressing, holler atcha girl!
Middle school came and went, and so did my ability to shop in the juniors section. What I find most disturbing about this period of my life is that I played four sports a year. Had I not had that constant physical activity, I’m confident I would be sitting here right now in a special cubicle designed for the morbidly obese. Think steel chairs, expandable walls and a special dip in my desk where I could place the excess skin hanging off of my elbows.
*** I want to interject here and profusely apologize to anyone who has excess skin hanging off of their elbows or any other sort of condition resulting from morbid obesity***
To make a long story only a little bit long, I was fortunate enough to grow out of my chubby phase and am now the proud owner of zippers and buttons and tank tops, oh my! But that’s not to say I have completely changed my ways. Everyone is bound to have a relapse or two and I've decided to briefly highlight some of those below.
Spring, 2002: Eating macaroni at a feverish pace, I forgot the importance of chewing. Minutes later, I sneezed. Two whole macaroni noodles, cheese still on them, appeared on my lap. I coughed up two more noodles in the following half hour. Bright side: snack for later!
Spring 2002 ( two months later): Repeat of situation above. Bright side: none.
Fall 2004: I drop a cracker on the bathroom floor minutes before biology is about to begin. I pick up said cracker and eat it. Bright side: it was the half without the peanut butter.
Summer 2005: I gain 11 pounds during a 5 day cruise. Bright side: I experienced beef wellington.
Winter 2007: While studying abroad in England, I participate in a cookie eating contest. Final result – 27 and a half cookies in 30 minutes, dry heaving and a crushing defeat. Bright side: contrary to what I thought, I was not turned off from future cookie consumption.
Spring 2007: After four months abroad in England, my jeans begin to tear at the thighs and I come to the realization that my own fat has pushed through denim. Bright side: hello, built in air vents!
The bottom-line is this. I am always going to eat macaroni faster than I should, I am always going to eat more than one pack of gushers and I am always going to adhere to the five second rule, bathroom stall or not. And if one day I pick up a case of oral herpes from a cracker or sneeze out a full Kraft dinosaur noodle while on a date, so be it.
At least it’s a good story.
I laugh now only because I am afforded the luxury of purchasing pants complete with a button and zipper. There was a dark period of my life, circa 1996, when I couldn’t fit into anything that didn’t involve some sort of elastic waistband. Was I obese? Technically, yes I was. “Obese” is such a negative term though and one that doesn’t seem quite fair to throw on an innocent eleven year old who enjoys indulging in a pack of gushers (or four) every afternoon while watching The Rosie O’Donnell show.
But if weighing 100 pounds at the age of 10 makes me “obese”, then fine, call me what you will. Anyone who feels satisfied after five tiny chewy candies is no friend of mine. Candies with FRUIT in the center, might I add! Nevertheless, these mid-afternoon binges were of no help to my waistline as I became increasingly similar in appearance to a chipmunk. Minus an excess of hair and a tail.
The only real ace I drew during those middle school years was a true and intense love for the Charlotte Hornets. Looking back, I think it was more of a true and intense love for their team colors, but that’s neither here nor there. Sporting team swish pants everyday for the greater part of sixth grade, buttons and zippers were no longer much of a concern. As an added bonus, the swishing sound of the incredibly flammable pants made my presence known in the halls. Free to move about in the elasticity as I pleased, I welcomed my favorite treats with open arms. Oreos, get over here! Nutter Butters, do your thang! Carrots dripping in ranch dressing, holler atcha girl!
Middle school came and went, and so did my ability to shop in the juniors section. What I find most disturbing about this period of my life is that I played four sports a year. Had I not had that constant physical activity, I’m confident I would be sitting here right now in a special cubicle designed for the morbidly obese. Think steel chairs, expandable walls and a special dip in my desk where I could place the excess skin hanging off of my elbows.
*** I want to interject here and profusely apologize to anyone who has excess skin hanging off of their elbows or any other sort of condition resulting from morbid obesity***
To make a long story only a little bit long, I was fortunate enough to grow out of my chubby phase and am now the proud owner of zippers and buttons and tank tops, oh my! But that’s not to say I have completely changed my ways. Everyone is bound to have a relapse or two and I've decided to briefly highlight some of those below.
Spring, 2002: Eating macaroni at a feverish pace, I forgot the importance of chewing. Minutes later, I sneezed. Two whole macaroni noodles, cheese still on them, appeared on my lap. I coughed up two more noodles in the following half hour. Bright side: snack for later!
Spring 2002 ( two months later): Repeat of situation above. Bright side: none.
Fall 2004: I drop a cracker on the bathroom floor minutes before biology is about to begin. I pick up said cracker and eat it. Bright side: it was the half without the peanut butter.
Summer 2005: I gain 11 pounds during a 5 day cruise. Bright side: I experienced beef wellington.
Winter 2007: While studying abroad in England, I participate in a cookie eating contest. Final result – 27 and a half cookies in 30 minutes, dry heaving and a crushing defeat. Bright side: contrary to what I thought, I was not turned off from future cookie consumption.
Spring 2007: After four months abroad in England, my jeans begin to tear at the thighs and I come to the realization that my own fat has pushed through denim. Bright side: hello, built in air vents!
The bottom-line is this. I am always going to eat macaroni faster than I should, I am always going to eat more than one pack of gushers and I am always going to adhere to the five second rule, bathroom stall or not. And if one day I pick up a case of oral herpes from a cracker or sneeze out a full Kraft dinosaur noodle while on a date, so be it.
At least it’s a good story.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Employee of the Month...Not Quite
According to a recent article on the journalistically sound AIM Zones homepage, people who have overly decorated cubicles are usually the ones least committed to their work. After taking a quick survey of my own cubicle, I noted the following:
3 foreign flags, 3 postcards, 2 Indian pillow cases turned tapestries, a decorative tea towel, a poster of The Wonder Years cast (who many co-workers have assumed is my own family, to which I ask, why would I have a glossy giant poster of my family dressed up in 1960’s clothing???), 1 photo-shopped picture of me as a High School Musical cast member, 1 softball displayed on a Loch Ness Monster candy dish, 2 basketball bobble-heads, 1 snow globe, 3 framed pictures, 4 magazine spreads of Ireland, 2 prairie dog magnets, and several quotes that suggest I am living in what I consider to be nothing short of a prison (“If you want to be happy, be,” “Saoirse” aka “freedom” in Gaelic, “You Go Where Life Takes You”…etc.)
Initially concerned that I was barely giving my current position the ol’ college try, I thought back to my last job as a salesman in Ireland. It begged the inevitable question; how much of my heart and soul had I really put into being a Tasty Sandwich Girl?
Some of you may be wondering, what exactly was your role as a Tasty Sandwich Girl??? Well, it depends on who’s asking. If you are a future employer, person of wealth and/or dignified stature, or President Obama, as a Tasty Sandwich Girl, I quickly rose to the top of the sales world by my boot straps, delivering good cheer and delicious products to important international businessmen in Ireland.
If, however, you are of no real importance, I will tell you the truth. My life as a sambo peddler was one of hard knocks, tears, a trip to the local hospital, and questionable dedication.
Some of you may still be plagued with questions. How does one get into the sandwich selling business? Did you wear a uniform? Did you eat your own product?
I’m here to answer all of your questions.
Desperate to return abroad after an amazing semester in England my junior year, I decided last summer that moving to Ireland for five months without a job or place to live would be just the solution. I suppose picking up a newspaper before I flew to Ireland would have been helpful, as I would have had some indication of the economic downturn the land of green was once again taking. Instead, I arrived in Galway with two of my best friends, certain I would find a job the first or second day.
Three weeks later, I had one prospect – faithful employee of the Tasty Sandwich Guy company. I use the term “company” loosely, considering this operation was run by one man who met me for an interview at the local aquarium. He explained that the job was perfect for a competitive go-getter such as myself and assured me the top salesman in his sister “company” made an average of 60 euros a day for only 4 hours of work. Some even made over 100.
I’ve never been a mathematician, but the arithmetic seemed simple enough. For every sandwich (or sambo, as the Irish would say) sold, I made one euro. I was thrilled to have any job at all, and excited at the prospect of getting out there and talking to Irish people everyday.
My first day of work, I waited in the parking lot of a grocery store for my boss to arrive. This should have probably alarmed me, but at the time, a parking lot seemed as natural as any other place for a “company” to kick-off the day. My boss arrived a few minutes later and opened the trunk of the car where all the sandwiches sat, wrapped and stacked in neat piles. Once again, nothing about this situation seemed off to me. He handed me a fanny pack, which was to be my life source and storage container of all the money I would be making. I’ve never been a fan of the fanny pack but who was I to argue with the uniform?
Next came the Little Red Riding Hood-esque baskets where the sandwich would sit. The ad in the newspaper never mentioned heavy lifting, and I was alarmed to find my arm going a bit numb after about half an hour of carrying the basket. After being reprimanded about my footwear (mental note: Nike shoes don’t scream “professional”….only sandwiches that come from car trunks do), I began my route. Looking back, my life was fairly similar to that of a prostitute. Similarities: designated blocks/territories, selling of goods, loss of dignity and personal respect, working of the streets. Differences: I never had sex on the job and I never met Richard Gere.
From the hours of 9 to 12, my job as the Tasty Sandwich Bitch er uh Girl was to trudge up and down a designated route in Galway business parks, knocking on every office door along the way and opening with the phrase “Have you brought your lunch today?’ While most would find this degrading, I saw it as an opportunity. I’ve always been afraid of confrontation and learned this was not helpful in the world of sales. People would start asking questions such as “where are these sandwiches made?,” to which I would reply “ummm a local…factory?”
I’m not one to brag, but initially I was a huge hit. I found particular success in the hardware stores, where I quickly learned to undo a few buttons on my shirt before going in to speak with the older Irish men. Chicken Tikkas and Tuna Sambos were flying off the basket and by the end of my second week, I had made up to 90 euros in a single day. I was sandwiches ahead of my other two fellow peddlers and my boss said he’d never seen anything like it.
The sambos, I might add, really were delicious and I was confident in our product. Sales evened out after that and the next few weeks I reached a comfortable plateau. The job was beginning to take a toll on my body though, and blisters were covering my feet. For the next few months, I made the stylistically-sound decision to wear white socks and black Mary Jane-esque Sketchers to keep my feet from bleeding. This complemented the black fanny pack beautifully. In addition to my poor feet, my lungs were also getting destroyed. Little known fact: it rains in Ireland. A LOT. And as a Tasty Sandwich Girl, you are expected to work, rain or shine. Once again, much like a prostitute. Initially wearing a hooded rain jacket, I decided my sales would probably increase if people felt sorry for me. I stopped wearing my hood and would enter stores dripping wet in the hopes that someone would take pity on my sorry state and decide they did in fact want a salsa wrap. This worked really well until I later developed an infection and was forced to go to the hospital.
About a month into work, the company was suddenly shut down. An evil man on my route claimed we were not following health regulations and mumbled something about a lack of refrigeration. Apparently, sandwiches originating in a BMW trunk before being displayed on a basket in the sun for four hours is not cool with some people. Unsure of whether I’d work again, I was told to be on standby while my boss figured out a new plan.
The next week, I was back on the job. To keep the people pleased, I was now forced to store the sambos in a giant cooler with a shoulder strap. You’d be amazed how heavy 50 sandwiches are. Forced to take multiple breaks on the side of the road and rest my shoulders, I often asked myself, “is this worth it?” My sales were now dropping more and more every week as the novelty of an American girl with an amazing fashion sense wore off. I also started resenting the person I had become. My life on the streets revolved around numbers and I found myself mumbling inappropriate things when customers politely turned me down. Things such as “fuck you.” I began to feel like a joke and would often plop down on the side of the road by 10:30 am, dejected as I ate one of my own sandwiches. Certain businesses began asking me to no longer come around and I was later banned from a large corporate center after roaming around the cubicles with my cooler.
The beginning of the end came when, after a particularly frustrating day on the job, I spent my last hour of work in a pub, drinking a pint of Cider until it was time to meet my boss and dole out the money. This didn’t seem inappropriate to me at the time, a real indication of my mindset.
Fearful I would be fired any day, I began buying my own sandwiches and hiding them in my coat pockets to plump up the sales.
I’m sad to say I only made it three months as a Tasty Sandwich Girl. The day I realized I had actually lost money that week by buying more sandwiches than I had actually sold, I knew I wasn’t meant for this job. A week later I awkwardly returned the cooler and fanny pack to my boss and said farewell.
Sitting here now in my cubicle, there are certain things I miss about my time as a sandwich seller. The freedom of the outdoors, the condescending looks from professionals, the taste of a Chicken Tandoori on wheat. But all great things must come to an end.
Perhaps the AIM Zones article is accurate, and I am not as dedicated as my fellow co-workers. Yours truly may not get employee of the month anytime soon, and I certainly never attained such a status in Ireland. But I've yet to leave work early to get a pint and that has to count for something.
C’est la vie. At least it’s a good story.
3 foreign flags, 3 postcards, 2 Indian pillow cases turned tapestries, a decorative tea towel, a poster of The Wonder Years cast (who many co-workers have assumed is my own family, to which I ask, why would I have a glossy giant poster of my family dressed up in 1960’s clothing???), 1 photo-shopped picture of me as a High School Musical cast member, 1 softball displayed on a Loch Ness Monster candy dish, 2 basketball bobble-heads, 1 snow globe, 3 framed pictures, 4 magazine spreads of Ireland, 2 prairie dog magnets, and several quotes that suggest I am living in what I consider to be nothing short of a prison (“If you want to be happy, be,” “Saoirse” aka “freedom” in Gaelic, “You Go Where Life Takes You”…etc.)
Initially concerned that I was barely giving my current position the ol’ college try, I thought back to my last job as a salesman in Ireland. It begged the inevitable question; how much of my heart and soul had I really put into being a Tasty Sandwich Girl?
Some of you may be wondering, what exactly was your role as a Tasty Sandwich Girl??? Well, it depends on who’s asking. If you are a future employer, person of wealth and/or dignified stature, or President Obama, as a Tasty Sandwich Girl, I quickly rose to the top of the sales world by my boot straps, delivering good cheer and delicious products to important international businessmen in Ireland.
If, however, you are of no real importance, I will tell you the truth. My life as a sambo peddler was one of hard knocks, tears, a trip to the local hospital, and questionable dedication.
Some of you may still be plagued with questions. How does one get into the sandwich selling business? Did you wear a uniform? Did you eat your own product?
I’m here to answer all of your questions.
Desperate to return abroad after an amazing semester in England my junior year, I decided last summer that moving to Ireland for five months without a job or place to live would be just the solution. I suppose picking up a newspaper before I flew to Ireland would have been helpful, as I would have had some indication of the economic downturn the land of green was once again taking. Instead, I arrived in Galway with two of my best friends, certain I would find a job the first or second day.
Three weeks later, I had one prospect – faithful employee of the Tasty Sandwich Guy company. I use the term “company” loosely, considering this operation was run by one man who met me for an interview at the local aquarium. He explained that the job was perfect for a competitive go-getter such as myself and assured me the top salesman in his sister “company” made an average of 60 euros a day for only 4 hours of work. Some even made over 100.
I’ve never been a mathematician, but the arithmetic seemed simple enough. For every sandwich (or sambo, as the Irish would say) sold, I made one euro. I was thrilled to have any job at all, and excited at the prospect of getting out there and talking to Irish people everyday.
My first day of work, I waited in the parking lot of a grocery store for my boss to arrive. This should have probably alarmed me, but at the time, a parking lot seemed as natural as any other place for a “company” to kick-off the day. My boss arrived a few minutes later and opened the trunk of the car where all the sandwiches sat, wrapped and stacked in neat piles. Once again, nothing about this situation seemed off to me. He handed me a fanny pack, which was to be my life source and storage container of all the money I would be making. I’ve never been a fan of the fanny pack but who was I to argue with the uniform?
Next came the Little Red Riding Hood-esque baskets where the sandwich would sit. The ad in the newspaper never mentioned heavy lifting, and I was alarmed to find my arm going a bit numb after about half an hour of carrying the basket. After being reprimanded about my footwear (mental note: Nike shoes don’t scream “professional”….only sandwiches that come from car trunks do), I began my route. Looking back, my life was fairly similar to that of a prostitute. Similarities: designated blocks/territories, selling of goods, loss of dignity and personal respect, working of the streets. Differences: I never had sex on the job and I never met Richard Gere.
From the hours of 9 to 12, my job as the Tasty Sandwich Bitch er uh Girl was to trudge up and down a designated route in Galway business parks, knocking on every office door along the way and opening with the phrase “Have you brought your lunch today?’ While most would find this degrading, I saw it as an opportunity. I’ve always been afraid of confrontation and learned this was not helpful in the world of sales. People would start asking questions such as “where are these sandwiches made?,” to which I would reply “ummm a local…factory?”
I’m not one to brag, but initially I was a huge hit. I found particular success in the hardware stores, where I quickly learned to undo a few buttons on my shirt before going in to speak with the older Irish men. Chicken Tikkas and Tuna Sambos were flying off the basket and by the end of my second week, I had made up to 90 euros in a single day. I was sandwiches ahead of my other two fellow peddlers and my boss said he’d never seen anything like it.
The sambos, I might add, really were delicious and I was confident in our product. Sales evened out after that and the next few weeks I reached a comfortable plateau. The job was beginning to take a toll on my body though, and blisters were covering my feet. For the next few months, I made the stylistically-sound decision to wear white socks and black Mary Jane-esque Sketchers to keep my feet from bleeding. This complemented the black fanny pack beautifully. In addition to my poor feet, my lungs were also getting destroyed. Little known fact: it rains in Ireland. A LOT. And as a Tasty Sandwich Girl, you are expected to work, rain or shine. Once again, much like a prostitute. Initially wearing a hooded rain jacket, I decided my sales would probably increase if people felt sorry for me. I stopped wearing my hood and would enter stores dripping wet in the hopes that someone would take pity on my sorry state and decide they did in fact want a salsa wrap. This worked really well until I later developed an infection and was forced to go to the hospital.
About a month into work, the company was suddenly shut down. An evil man on my route claimed we were not following health regulations and mumbled something about a lack of refrigeration. Apparently, sandwiches originating in a BMW trunk before being displayed on a basket in the sun for four hours is not cool with some people. Unsure of whether I’d work again, I was told to be on standby while my boss figured out a new plan.
The next week, I was back on the job. To keep the people pleased, I was now forced to store the sambos in a giant cooler with a shoulder strap. You’d be amazed how heavy 50 sandwiches are. Forced to take multiple breaks on the side of the road and rest my shoulders, I often asked myself, “is this worth it?” My sales were now dropping more and more every week as the novelty of an American girl with an amazing fashion sense wore off. I also started resenting the person I had become. My life on the streets revolved around numbers and I found myself mumbling inappropriate things when customers politely turned me down. Things such as “fuck you.” I began to feel like a joke and would often plop down on the side of the road by 10:30 am, dejected as I ate one of my own sandwiches. Certain businesses began asking me to no longer come around and I was later banned from a large corporate center after roaming around the cubicles with my cooler.
The beginning of the end came when, after a particularly frustrating day on the job, I spent my last hour of work in a pub, drinking a pint of Cider until it was time to meet my boss and dole out the money. This didn’t seem inappropriate to me at the time, a real indication of my mindset.
Fearful I would be fired any day, I began buying my own sandwiches and hiding them in my coat pockets to plump up the sales.
I’m sad to say I only made it three months as a Tasty Sandwich Girl. The day I realized I had actually lost money that week by buying more sandwiches than I had actually sold, I knew I wasn’t meant for this job. A week later I awkwardly returned the cooler and fanny pack to my boss and said farewell.
Sitting here now in my cubicle, there are certain things I miss about my time as a sandwich seller. The freedom of the outdoors, the condescending looks from professionals, the taste of a Chicken Tandoori on wheat. But all great things must come to an end.
Perhaps the AIM Zones article is accurate, and I am not as dedicated as my fellow co-workers. Yours truly may not get employee of the month anytime soon, and I certainly never attained such a status in Ireland. But I've yet to leave work early to get a pint and that has to count for something.
C’est la vie. At least it’s a good story.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
What Is My Life?
If this looks like another blog from a wannabe writer who thinks their life would make a great novel turned major motion picture starring the likes of Molly Shannon, it probably is. I, like millions of others out there, am egotistical enough to think each and every awkward, embarrassing and funny moment of my existence warrants a story for all to devour.
Whether or not anyone deems this blog worthy of reading is yet to be determined. I can only hope that in finding the funny in every situation, and embracing the moments that most want to forget , I have a story worth telling.
Did I especially enjoy sitting next to a homeless man on a 13-hour bus ride who smelled like baloney and rotting shoes? No. Did his unsolicited thigh massage and whispering of sweet nothings fulfill all dreams of a European romance? Not exactly. Did I wish him the best and thank God I left that bus with an amazing story (not to mention a relaxed upper leg region)? Absolutely.
If you particularly enjoy tales of public transportation molestation, such as the one above, or any other traditionally embarrassing situation, you may find something of value in these little posts.
And if a single person never reads this blog and I come to the realization that I have nothing worth sharing, that will be okay, too.
At least it's a good story.
Whether or not anyone deems this blog worthy of reading is yet to be determined. I can only hope that in finding the funny in every situation, and embracing the moments that most want to forget , I have a story worth telling.
Did I especially enjoy sitting next to a homeless man on a 13-hour bus ride who smelled like baloney and rotting shoes? No. Did his unsolicited thigh massage and whispering of sweet nothings fulfill all dreams of a European romance? Not exactly. Did I wish him the best and thank God I left that bus with an amazing story (not to mention a relaxed upper leg region)? Absolutely.
If you particularly enjoy tales of public transportation molestation, such as the one above, or any other traditionally embarrassing situation, you may find something of value in these little posts.
And if a single person never reads this blog and I come to the realization that I have nothing worth sharing, that will be okay, too.
At least it's a good story.
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