A story about pie and stupid diseases
Nobody expects their chicken pot pie to be interrupted with the sudden need to go to the emergency room, so you can imagine my surprise when that’s exactly what happened to me a couple of weeks ago.
Three hours, two pills and an EKG later, I’m the lucky winner of an acid reflux disease called GERD and what my doctor THINKS is a severe case of anxiety. “Thinks” because I have a few symptoms that suggest I might have something much, much worse, but until I can afford the medical insurance I’ll need for routine trips to the doctor, anxiety it is. (AND HERE’S THE PART WHERE I YELL ABOUT THE $2,500 BILL I GOT IN THE MAIL FOR EMERGENCY SERVICES, WHICH, LET ME TELL YOU, ISN’T HELPING MY ANXIETY ONE BIT.)
The day after my super fun trip to the hospital I had to hop on a plane to Los Angeles for a content management conference—not the best idea ever, but the company I was covering had paid for me to go and it would’ve been pretty shitty to call them up just a day before and cancel on account of my crazy. So I went. And I wrote. And I contracted pink eye. And I didn’t sleep for 48 hours. And I spent most of my free time alone in my hotel, rocking back and forth in the shower with a hot cup of caffeine free tea (because of the GERD), wishing I had filled my new prescriptions before traveling hundreds of miles away from home.
I realize how crazy I sound right now, I really do. If you’re an employer, a potential employer, a lover, a family member, or hell – GAS will probably be around forever! – my future kid (MOMMY TOLD YOU NOT TO GOOGLE HER), I promise I’m not batshit out of my mind. I just think and worry about oh, at least a thousand things per minute, and I suppose this is my body’s way of finally telling me that that shit ain’t cool.
Bear with me, this story just reminded me of another story. Really quick: my sense of direction is shit. And when I say that, I mean that if someone painted over my street sign with a different name, I’d probably drive up and down the cross street looking for my turn. Forever. Ergo, the first time I drove with a driving instructor we got completely lost when the session was over and it was time to get back to my house. We drove aimlessly for a good hour, during which night fell and it started raining. Did I mention this was my first time driving ever? Picture it: tiny hopeless 17-year-old drives for the first time in the dark during a storm while her instructor sits beside her, eating Cheetos and quietly cursing.
Actually, my instructor turned to me and said something along the lines of, “Hey, do you realize how well you’re doing given the circumstances?”
And that’s when I calmed down and found my house. Similarly, I got through my first lone business trip with all my limbs and a new understanding of records management to boot. And even if nobody else is proud of me for it, I sure as hell am.
Here’s the part where I tell you I’ve been making moves to make sure 2010 is not a wet blanket, because despite all the problems that’ve already gone down since the ball dropped, my outlook for the next twelve months is strangely positive. I mean, to tell you the truth I kinda fell off the whole this-is-my-year bandwagon, because really, it doesn’t matter if it’s January or June or December. Every day is a good day to pick up the slack or be better or try something new. It just so happens that my motivational fairy showed up this month.
Stay tuned for news about my activities. For now, I'll just tell you they involve money and travel and shoulder kisses. And perhaps the occasional heart palpitation.
Declined
Last week, after realizing that I had successfully cooked a bunch of packaged food with Japanese instructions, my roommate asked timidly, "Are you starting to read Japanese now?"
Guys, I can't even tell you how badly I wanted to answer "yes" to that ridiculous, ridiculous question. Sadly, as far as I know it's impossible to learn a language just by staring at it. Fortunately for me (and my stomach), picture instructions are universally understood. Besides, there's really only one way to cook ramen, right?
Let me tell you, t's not like I'm not trying to get around and communicate...it's just HARD. I thought body language made up the majority of communication, but apparently that only applies to the United States. In Japan, you have to know the language. Otherwise something very, very strange happens to your brain as it tries to switch over to a different atmosphere and is consistently denied access. Out of a crippling appetite for understanding--something! anything!--you start to read colors and photos as you would words, start to notice things you never would at home, like nature. Or the way the nail on your middle finger curves slightly inward on the right side. Your breathing patters. The new pinhead-sized mole on the inside of your ankle. The total number of times you blink per hour.
Even more disturbing is how much you start to love things for the simple fact that you recognize them, like baby cries and *gasp!* numbers.
Internet, I am not a numbers person. I normally loathe them. I loathe them so much in fact, that it took me 4 years to finally take the one math class that was required of me in college. I registered for one every year but ended up dropping it because I didn't vibe well enough with the teacher. Didn't vibe well enough with the teacher! Can you believe that? As if I was in some math class speed-dating adventure.
I am a writer. A talker. A person of words. Communication is my forte and I'm in a land where the language looks like fucking decoration. Can you imagine what that's doing to my mind? To my SOUL? I am, in fact, so starved for the tiniest morsel of something I recognize that when I overhear tourists from English-speaking countries talk, no matter the topic, I get a boner. Srsly, the biggest hard on you ever did see. In every other instance, no matter how wide I open my eyes or which direction I flail my arms, nobody gets what I'm going on about. To everyone else, I just look like a chimp.
So here I am, this stupid foreign chimp, hanging out in a tiny apartment in Tokyo with my roommate from college, who happens to be growing exceedingly tired of having to deal with me and my non-understanding ways. She works all day Mon-Fri (and by all day I mean all day because people in Tokyo do not believe in sleep) and understandably wants nothing on the weekends but uninterrupted loafing time. As a result, my hopes of getting to know this city have been whittled down to a nubbin. I've lightened up severely on the whole "what does that say?" bit out of the fear that she's going to turn around and punch me, and when her non-English speaking boyfriend turns to me and vomits up an entire speech or question in Japanese, I blink several times and quietly wish for a hole to curl up and die in.
I feel bad about it, really. There's nothing like going from being an independent, social butterfly to a non-communicative, twitchy primate that needs to be babysat. And so, in a desperate attempt to prove my worthiness as a temporary member of the Japanese society to my fed-up roommate, I decided to cook her dinner.
One day while she was at work, I gathered up every ounce of bravery I had and walked, alone, to the nearest grocery store. Throw into this pathetic sounding equation my non-existent sense of direction, Tokyo's TINY, jam-packed-with-everything-you-can-think-of streets, and the absence of actual street signs (NOT THAT I'D UNDERSTAND THEM ANYWAY) and suddenly it's like, whoa, Chelsi, how did you survive such a breakneck adventure?!
No clue, but somehow I arrived at the store without getting lost or kidnapped by some band of rampant, magical anime characters. This accomplishment felt like that scene in Castaway where Tom Hanks manages to procure a tiny wisp of smoke from two sticks and is like, I AM MAN. I MADE FIRE. It didn't bother me that I didn't understand any of the food I was looking at, or that I stood in an aisle for at least 5 minutes, unsure if the bottle I was holding was full of mayonnaise or baby formula. I had gotten to the store and that meant I could SURVIVE.
That is, until I got to the checkout counter and my credit card was declined. The clerk turned the register screen around to show me the big black "!" all dark and scary like a death omen, and to further illustrate the problem made a big "X" with her arms while repeating the word "sagarime" over and over again. Even though it was pretty obvious what she was saying, I googled the word anyway. It's defined as "eyes slanting downward" and "decline." I feel a racist joke coming on; a racist joke that I think would be totally excusable because I myself am a product of slanty-eyed people, but I'm going to pass.
Anyhoo--PROTIP: If you're going to travel to foreign lands, make sure you tell your credit card company beforehand. You know, unless you *want* to feel utterly alone even though you're surrounded by more people you've ever been in your entire life and broke to boot.
Tragic, isn't it?
In closing, I just want to point out that I'm aware that I'm not giving Japan the credit it deserves. I only talk about the terrible things, much like people do when they're in a relationship. Heh. Truth is, Tokyo isn't that bad of a boyfriend. I mean, he hasn't put out yet, but that's cool, I ain't no hussy.
In other words, a post on the good things is coming soon. Promise, promise.
A story about how I tried to go to Japan but failed
This week all posts were supposed to be typed and published on Japan’s zany future time zone, but alas, I am still in good ol’ California. Good ol’ dry, blistering hot, crap for brains, won’t let gays get married, California. Also home of the SFO airport, where the dumbest human beings IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING and DESERVE NOTHING IN LIFE.
Also, you should know that I’m sick, and sickness usually has a strange kind of effect on my behavior. In fact, this bout, which started on Thursday, was so bad that what I thought was the tickle of a stray hair shimmying its way down my front was actually beads of sweat. Gathering together and plotting my demise.
Anyway. So off I went on Saturday to the airport with a single carryon and the tail end of the plague, ready to experience foreign lands and maybe, just maybe, a public bath or two. I had fifty minutes to check in which is usually fine, but as I walked over to the United check-in area, I noticed an awfully long line. Not just at security, but everywhere else, too. Nervous, I felt it would be better to expedite the process instead of my usual tactic, which is to wander around until I figure out where to go. So I ask this guy, we’ll call him Tall Thin Stupid Dude, where to get my boarding pass. TTSD looks at my ticket and says with an obligatory smile, “If you don’t have to check in a bag, you can get your boarding pass at one of the machines over there” and he then points to a machine.
So I go to a machine. It asks me for a confirmation number. Then I spend ten minutes punching in every single mother fucking number I can find on my ticket. None of them work. Enter my friend Arwen into the equation (she drove me to the airport) who says, “Pick up that receiver there and ask for help.” So I pick up the receiver and the kind lady on the other end, after typing my name into her magical computer, says, “You have a paper ticket, and people with paper tickets have to check in manually.” I thank her and find the next nearest United worker, we’ll call her Short Stout Stupid Chick, and say, “Excuse me, but apparently I have to check in manually if I have a paper ticket?” SSSC looks at my ticket and says, “Your flight is in 30 minutes. You’re not going to make it, but go stand in line over there” and she points to a line.
Discouraged, I go to the line and wait for another 5 years before the person at the counter looks at my ticket and says, “You’re in the wrong line. This is for first class customers only.” I’m not sure what happened at this point. Either I screamed or the sheer rage emanating from my body started to glow, but a third United employee found his way to my side and the conversation went something like this:
Older Non Listening Dude: What’s wrong?
Me: I was told to stand in this line but it’s the wrong line and now I’m going to miss my flight.
ONLD: Who told you that?
Me: That woman over th-
ONLD: Where are you from?
Me: The east bay but—
ONLD: So you were late?
Me: What? No, but first that guy over there told me to go to a machine an—
ONLD: What guy?
Me: The guy with th—
ONLD: This is what I’m gonna do for you, RICHARD!
Richard turned out to be one of the guys who checks people in in the area I was supposed to check in. I didn’t mind him so much; he reminded me of Denzel Washington. After ONLD alerted him, he told the next person in line to wait so I could cut in. After reviewing my info, Fake Denzel informed me as politely as he could (but in that very direct and wonderful Denzel way) that he couldn’t check me in because it was now 20 minutes until my flight’s departure, so he put me on standby for the next flight.
Fast forward to the gate for the standby flight. I approach the woman at the counter and say, “I’m on the waitlist, so I have to-” and the woman, we’ll call her Heinous Bitch, I Bet Your Parents Hate You, interrupts with “WAIT.” (Bitch!!)
Dejected, irritated, sick, I go over to a chair and watch the line of people with REAL TICKETS load up the plane. Then, just as the last ticket holder boards and I’m about to go back over and have a pleasant chat with HBIBYPHY, this family of three runs up to the counter and acts like a pack of wild monkeys, flailing their arms and standby tickets around, drooling and shit. Then they board the plane. Then HBIBYPHY looks at me and says, “I’m sorry, the flight is full.” And I’m like, “But I was here first! I’m supposed to transfer from L.A. to a flight to Japan!” And she says, “But they had a higher priority than you. You can go to the Customer Service line and talk to them about getting a different flight.”
So I go to the customer service line and wait for AN HOUR. During that hour a few things happen: 1. Another plane to L.A. leaves. 2. Another plane to L.A. leaves. 3. I realize HBIBYPHY didn’t even look at my ticket and wonder how she could’ve known that the family of chimps had higher priority than me. By the time I finally get to a customer service agent, all of the flights that would’ve gotten me to LAX in time to catch my flight to Narita are long gone. The customer service woman (she was a nice lady, we won’t nickname her) reviews my sad situation and asks, “Why did you come to the customer service line?” I respond by pointing so hard at HBIBYPHY that I think my arm is going to pop right out of its socket. Then I say, as if words could kill, “Because SHE told me to!” The customer service woman looks at me over some silly looking half-moon lenses and says, “Well, for future reference, when you miss a flight your name is transferred to the waitlist of the next departing flight. You didn’t have to wait in this line.”
She then reschedules my flight for Friday at no charge. She also knocks the L.A. stop off entirely, so now I get to enjoy a direct flight to Narita. We like her.
Back in the car after Arwen picked my sorry ass up she said, “I asked one of the United workers to check if you had gotten on the plane. He looked up your name and told me you had, in fact, not gotten on the standby flight which was odd because it still had seats left.”
This is the part where my brain exploded and I died.
Sigh. We’ll try again on Friday.
Pink Treats of Death and Prophylactics
When my most recent ex-factor admitted to sticking his dick in other vaginas behind my back, I made him get tested for STDs and all that jazz at Planned Parenthood. I could have gone myself and refused to tell him the results just to be an asshole, but seeing as how he HATES going to get tested and I wanted to put him in the most awkward and uncomfortable situation that I possibly could, I went with it.
They also left some stuff of their own behind, including a wrapper for those wretched pink snowball snacks, an empty Cherry Coke bottle and a Broncos hat, so I suppose it was probably easy for my dad to believe me when I told him that the condoms weren’t mine, but then again I said it while trying not to throw up and I’m sure that sweat was projectile-shooting out of every pore on my body, so who knows, maybe he thinks his daughter is a hooker. That would explain why last night he tried to talk to me about why it’s bad to have one night stands.
RITA BOWDEN IS A BITCH
Check #295: paid to the order of Gina Bowden in the amount of two hundred dollars
Check#296: paid to the order of Raley's in the amount of seventy five dollars and ninety three cents
Check#290: paid to the order of Kohl's in the amount of one hundred thirty four dollars and twenty one cents (Sidenote: Xmas gifts!)
Check#291: paid to the order of Rite Aid in the amount of ninety dollars and sixty eight cents
That's a grand total of $500.82 missing from my checking account because THERE WAS A CHECK BOOK IN MY CAR WHEN IT WAS STOLEN.
Can the downward spiral just be over now? CAN IT?!
She Also Said God Must Hate Me
So today I walked into the Journalism lab on campus to meet a friend, the same one who asked if I carried the devil in my handbag (because within two days my car was stolen, my ID went missing, I lost all my notes for my finals, and the alarm at her work went off as soon as I walked in). I sat down at a computer beside her and started to type up an interview I had done a few days prior, and roughly thirty minutes later the fire alarm went off. As we were evacuating the building like a herd of cows, my friend looked at me and said, “I really have no words for you at this point. But I will say that it makes me feel a little safer when I’m hanging out with you because if something bad is going to happen, it definitely isn’t going to happen to me!”
And Then Sometimes Life is Like This
I’ve decided to stop fighting the fact that I am just one of those people that have landslides of bad things happen to them; that are accident-prone; that attract weird people and, for some reason, despite all of my efforts to appear too distracted in public places, the way I manage to invite conversation from strangers. That last part about the strangers is usually the hardest to deal with. The landslides of bad things eventually level off and accidents are forgiven but strangers consistently trying to engage in a dialogue with moi? Gross. I’m a small person, I don’t carry pepper spray like I should, and I spend a great deal of time in the city where people are crazy so, my fear is understandable, isn’t it?
I’ve tried many, many times to rid myself of this problem but it hasn’t worked and I’m at the point where I just don’t have the brain power or energy to stress over it anymore, so, several weeks ago when I was in the bookstore reading some literature by Michelle Tea, I didn’t give the random man that came up and sat beside me much thought. I considered getting up and walking away, but figured it might look rude and I was really comfortable in my smooshy chair, so I tried desperately to appear obsessed with my dyke lit and hoped that he wouldn’t open his mouth. But he did. Yes, yes, he did. Of course he did. And when he opened his mouth every cell in my body began to frown and brace itself for the awkward conversation that would inevitably follow. But what I expected to be horrid was actually quite pleasant, and, surprisingly enough, his excessive jewelry, weird style and far-out personality didn’t turn me off like someone I once knew.
I eventually got around to spilling my soul to him (I have a problem doing this to strangers) and I expressed my frustration at my bad luck. I explained that bad luck comes at me in waves and it’s always been like that for me. One little thing tends to set off a whole string of things until it gets down to my last nerve and I implode. I didn’t go into much detail about particular incidents in my past, but I complained so much that I halfway expected him to suddenly remember that he left his iron on or spring out of his seat with a newfound love for standing, and walking….away. But he didn’t! He actually recommended that I watch some movie called The Secret because word on the street is that it is that one life-changing thing that people like me need to straighten their shit out. I’ve since researched The Secret and now know that it’s about the Law of Attraction, which is basically the simple idea that whatever you put out into the universe is what you’re going to get back. If you think positive thoughts, good things will happen to you. The first twenty minutes of the film is on YouTube and it shows some average looking guy with a huge house and a gorgeous wife talking about how he managed to hone the power of The Secret. After watching it I thought, okay, it looks pretty cheesy and hoaxy but, why not. I’ll try it.
Since then Mr. Surprisingly Cool Bookstore Man and I have hung out twice. Once at a Halloween party where I dressed up as Amy Winehouse (seriously) and he as character named Tuxedo Mask from a Japanese cartoon that brings me back to my junior high days, and a second time at Hippie Hill. Now, if you’re a native of San Francisco and you don’t know what Hippie Hill is, it’s okay. Neither did I. Surprisingly Cool was speechless when I told him I’d never been that far down Haight street, and honestly, I felt pretty square for not knowing of this supposedly fabulous place when I had lived so close to it for three whole months (I had a stint on Oak and Baker). But then, once we got there, I knew why I had never been before.
Hippie Hill, if you haven’t guessed, is a hill covered in hippies. Hippies that sit in big circles with bums and smoke weed and play strange instruments like bongo drums. Surprisingly Cool then became Unsurprisingly Weird and just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, he pulled out a mini keyboard that requires you to blow air into it via a small straw that’s attached in order to play notes. I seriously felt like I was in the Twilight Zone. Some bum was offering us hits off his pipe and the police were rolling by in their cars but not really doing anything and one guy kept doing these crazy body contorting things like he was an ex member of Cirque Du Soleil. Then things got really ugly: bums got mad because I was in their sunlight and Unsurprisingly Weird really wanted me to play the cowbells in their little jam session but I felt so repulsed by the idea of playing COW BELLS in the middle of a crowd of high hippies that I kind of just hugged myself and didn’t say anything. It was all just so surreal. Just before I imploded though, Unsurprisingly Weird borrowed a guitar from some guy and took me off to the side, away from the jamboree, and played the gorgeous song I Will by The Beatles, complete with lyrics.
So there I was, standing in the park on a crisp and cold but sunny day in San Francisco, being serenaded by a man I hardly know and it was lovely. Absolutely lovely. Any Full House fans out there? Do you remember the episode where Uncle Jesse sings Forever by the Beach Boys to Becky? His voice is soft and sweet and your skin just wants to melt off at the sound of it, right? Well it was like exactly like that. Except with drug dealers in the background.
This whole thing took place on Thursday evening and on Saturday morning as I was heading back to the East Bay on BART I was thinking about how much it’s benefited me to think positively and be kind to strangers. That I can deal with landslides of bad things happening to me AND weirdos coming up to talk to me because when I don’t make a fuss about it life is generally easier to handle and being serenaded is pretty hot. Then I got to the BART station only to find that my car had been stolen.
No, not towed, it was stolen. When the BART police finally paid attention to me they informed me that the car that was now in the place of mine, an old green Honda with bad paint and tinted windows, was also stolen. This means that the thieves just made a little swap and are probably just looking for temporary modes of transportation. This is now the SECOND time my car has been stolen. Isn't that crazy? I mean, people apply that never-get-struck-by-lightning-twice thing to really bad incidents like getting your car stolen, and I'd guess that that's generally true, but when it comes to me, THINK AGAIN MY FRIENDS. Oh it gets worse, too. Over the weekend I took even more public transportation than I usually do (out of necessity, of course) and somewhere along the way I lost my ID and notebook full of all my notes for the finals I have to take in 2 weeks.
Awesome, I know.
I’m currently driving a rental. A gigantic 2008 Grand Prix that makes me feel like an old woman. I drove it to Borders Book Store to see a friend who had already heard of my mishaps and as soon as I walked into the store the fire alarm went off. She took a look at the flashing lights, then turned her head to me and over the scream of the alarm she asked, “Do you just carry the devil around with you in your purse?”
And honestly folks, sometimes I think I do.