When I turned 17, one of my best friends, Lisa, had recently moved away, but she came to visit for my birthday. My birthday was on a Saturday that year, and her dad brought her over Friday night and she was spending the whole weekend at my house. We had the best time, looking at our yearbooks, making chocolate frosting in the kitchen at 2 am, and going to the park. On Saturday, my birthday, we went to the park, and then decided to go for a walk in the wooded area behind my neighborhood.

We called it "the bumpity road" when I was growing up. It was acres and acres of undeveloped private property, that the owners allowed people from the neighborhood to go on to hike or walk their dogs and stuff. A couple of kids even built treehouses there. As long as we didn't trash the place, the owners didn't really care. There were lots of trees, but not many of them were easily climbed- either they were tall eucalyptus trees with no footholds, or they were scrubby pine trees that were too densely branched. Lisa and I were fond of this one particular stand of eucalyptus trees. It was hard to get up the trunk and into the first yoke of the tree, but once you were there you could climb really high.

For some reason, my mom came with us on our walk, and much as we tried to convince her to climb the tree with us, she wouldn't. Instead she decided to stay on the ground and take pictures. Lisa gave me a boost into the tree and then I reached down to pull her up, they way we always did. But that morning I did something wrong and instead of pulling Lisa up into the tree, I fell down out of the tree. Amazingly, though I fell pretty much headfirst, I landed more sideways, coming down really hard on my hip. (And incidentally, right on a fallen branch, which left a lovely bruise.) I was a little dazed and had had the wind knocked out of me, but got up quickly and went to climb back into the tree- I was pretty rough and tumble, and still more than a bit of a tomboy. That was about when my mom noticed the blood. I had managed to not get any scrapes in the fall, nothing hurt except my bruised ip, but when I looked down, my left wrist was bleeding profusely. My mom, being a mom, had a pocket full of kleenex, which I used to wipe the blood away, revealing a deep looking cut. We headed back to my house to clean it, and I finally had to wrap the sleeve of my sweatshirt (my euro-disney sweatshirt!) around my wrist because it was still bleeding a lot.

When we got back to my house, my dad took one look at it and said it needed stitches, and we actually went to the emergency hospital in town rather than driving 30 minutes to the normal emergency room (I got banged up a lot, I lived in the emergency room for a few years). There, the triage nurse took a look at me, now with one of my dads bandanas wrapped around my arm, and wrote "suicide attempt" on my form, and rushed me into a cubicle in the back and gave me some clean gauze to hold against the cut. The doctor came pretty quickly, though the bleeding had slowed way down by that point, and asked me what had happened while he was looking at the cut. I said I fell out of a tree, and he looked at me very skeptically. He said that whatever I told him would be confidential, and asked if I was sure I had not intentionally hurt myself. I said, no, I fell out of a tree. I could tell he still did not believe me. Then he really started looking at it, and flushing it with saline to make sure the wound was clean before he stiched it up. And wouldn't you know it, little bits of bark came washing out.

It was really starting to hurt at that point, and I got all stitched up (4 stitches) and was about to be sent on my way, with a thick gauze bandage taped over the stitches, when a psychologist showed up to talk to me, because the triage nurse had called her saying there was a teenager who had attempted suicide in the ER. I had to explain, yet again, that I had fallen out of a tree, not cut myself on purpose, and again was not believed, at which point the doctor indicated the basin with the dirt and bark in it. Sheesh. You'd think if my parents were bringing me in for an attempted suicide, both myself and they would be far less calm than we were. I had to face similar inquiries and being doubted when I returned to school on Monday.

Last year I was a month early remembering my best friend's birthday. This year, I did not forget her birthday, I just kept forgetting to call her, which is not the same thing. I even set an outlook reminder to "Call Erica if you haven't already!". It popped up when I got to work, but she was at work so I decided to wait until the afternoon to call her. I left work early because I had an appointment, and was fixated on that, so forgot to call her. I went to the movies, and got out a few minutes after 11. She's usually asleep by then, but I looked at the clock in my car and mentally screamed "Crap!!" and picked up my phone and dialed her.

Erica: Hello (I love how she says it, she says "Huh-lay-oh". She has caller ID so she knew it was me)
Me: I have 49 minutes! I swear I didn't forget! It's 11:11, I have 49 minutes before I officially forgot to call you on your birthday!
Erica: It's okay
Me: But I didn't forget! All day I've been thinking that I needed to call you, but at the times I actually could have I forgot!

So we chatted for a bit, she had a really good birthday, so that was good. Then I hung up on her when my cell phone battery died, and I don't actually *know* her phone number, so I couldn't call her back from my landline. Oops.

This morning I took my first shower in the new bathroom. (Yeah, you know the one that's mine mine all mine? Yeah, that bathroom) And the first thing I noticed was the water pressure. It actually has some. The shower in the other bathroom doesn't have much at all. I remember when I moved to this house, that was one of the first "oh crap" signs. But I got used to it. So this morning the blast of water surprised the heck out of me. But it also made me very very happy, and almost made only getting four or so hours of sleep because the cat was flipping out worth it.

In other news, I know I said I'd be posting some stories. I'm trying, I really am, but lots of busyness has fallen on my head that has next to no turnaround time, so please forgive me. The good news though is that this situation just made my mom's month because I called and "needed her". I needed some reassuring of the kind that only my mom can give me. I didn't want to admit it for a long time, but my mom truly is my biggest fan, and she loves it when I call because I really need to just talk to her.

I had the following conversation with a friend over AIM last week. This is a friend I met through blogging, so there is a lot about me he doesn't know.

me: have I ever told you I used to want to be an x-ray technician?
him: no
him: that's interesting
me: yeah, I did til I was about 20
me: but I gave dental xrays in the Philippines and the chemicals made me sick, so I didn't want to anymore
him: ha! the shit that comes out of your head cracks me up. You should seriously blog more.
me: what? how does that crack you up?
him: I mean, really, who does dental x-rays in the Philippines?
me: umm, missionaries?
him: you were a missionary in the Philippines?
him: I didn't know that.
me: umm, not really, no
me: I went on a missions trip
me: I was there for 18 days
him: ah. spreadin' the good word?
me: yeah
me: it was a long time ago, back in my "gung-ho for Jesus" days
him: cool.
me: thats where the baby in the orphanage item in my "10 things I've done you probably haven't"

So, I'm taking that conversation as a bit of a challenge. I've got a list of stories I want to tell you all, that I just haven't gotten around to writing up. My goal is to get one story posted at least every other day (maybe not this week, as there is a ton going on, but I'll do my best).

The list so far:
- Falling out of a tree and having the ER triage nurse think I tried to kill myself.
- Falling in love with a baby in a Philippine orphanage and wanting to smuggle her home in my suitcase.
- Learning how to deliver a baby at home.
- Having a woman in McDonald's think my best friend was my daughter.
- The cakefight
- removing a friend from my life
- in trouble after lunch in elementary school
- AOL chat scare
- my mom and technology
- coyote in AZ

Any requests as to what you'd like me to tell first? If there is anything else I've briefly mentioned in a post somewhere that you'd like backstory on, leave it in comments.

As I've mentioned- the housemates that I call the "scary-crazies" are moving out. With this comes some good perks for me, in addition to not having to deal with their unpredictable behavior. I'm going to be moving into the master bedroom, which is twice the size of the room I'm in now. And, it has its own bathroom, so I won't have to share with Dave anymore. It's not like sharing a bathroom is all that bad, I've always done it, but Dave has this thing about not putting anything on the counters. In my old bathrooms, I've had little decorative touches, boxes of hair supplies, a toothbrush holder, that sort of thihg. And our current bathroom has a ton of counterspace - all comoletely devoid of anything, and it makes me crazy. But soon I'll have my own and can do whatever I want with the counter space in there.

I have all these plans of how I'd like my room to be, but it'll take me a while to get it there. If you want to help, go here and I will love you forever.

Bleh... Just when I think "oh, it's not so bad, things have improved, I can do this for another month", I stay home on a weekend. Mer just got home from work and she is *blasted*. She hurt her hip, someone asked her out for a drink, and apparently everyone kept buying her drinks. Now she has a bad hip, she's an emotional drunk so she's crying all over the place about the move, and she won't stay sitting down to take care of her hip. And me, of course I'm doing my maternal thing and just taking care of her, but I'm annoyed. It's like, SHUT UP ALREADY. WE had a really good night last night, we watched dvds and cooked a really yummy dinner together. I was actually starting to think I'd really miss her when they move. But I'm so sick of the drinking, so sick of the drama. April 20 can not come soon enough.

Yesterday, I left work really late. A little after 7 late. But I had stuff I needed to get done, and no plans for the evening, so I didn't mind. Yesterday was another gloriously sunny day. When I left work, it was dark, but the air still smelled like hot pavement, warm grass, and leaves. I went to the grocery store, and finally was pointed towards home at about 8:30. And I rolled the windows down in my car and enjoyed the night air... It was fabulous.

As for why I held my breath that it would continue on Thursday... Thursday was March 10. March 10 is the day I used to stay in bed with the covers over my head, because it was a jinxed day.

March 10, 1993 - My friend Lisa fainted at school and was passed out in a supply closet for an hour before anyone noticed. She had been really sick, and had been having fainting spells- she was not supposed to have been left alone. We figured in classes she'd be fine with all those people around. But she ducked into the closet to grab some stuff for class (it was an agriculture class) and passed out. I showed up to pick her up for lunch and no one knew where she was. We had to call an ambulance and she went to the hospital. She spent 23 hours in the emergency room because they couldn't figure out what was causing the fainting spells, then spent another week in the hospital after that.

March 10, 1994 - We had to put our cat, Max, to sleep because he had feline leukemia. As if that wasn't sad enough, Max was the cat we had gotten from a friend of ours who had died. Max was sort of our last tangible piece of Scott.

March 10, 1995 - Got in a big fight with my best friend, Valerie, over my spiritual beliefs and the fact that she didn't believe in me. Looking back it was sort of stupid, but at the time- it was totally bad.

March 10, 1996 and 1997 - didn't get out of bed

March 10, 1998 - Learned that Valerie was being beaten by her husband. I would have found this out eventually, it was just sort of coincidence that it was March 10.

1998 was the last time that March 10 had anything notably bad happen, but I'm still a little wary on that date.

I woke up this morning to it finally starting to look like spring. Truly, it is a gloriously sunny morning. Lately, when the sun has been out in the mornings, it has been sort of weak looking, with a bit of fog haze making the sunlight look thick, and not feel very warm. The kind of morning where you wake up and say to yourself "hey... sun..." and then roll over and go back to sleep. The kind of morning where you go, "but the sun is out", and wrap your sweater a little more tightly around you.

Not this day. This day, I opened my eyes to what little sunlight filters through to my east window being clear and bright and warm looking. I'm not sure how to describe it, but it looked like spring in my room. It actually made me *want* to get up, and look in my closet for something "springy" as opposed to the black and navy blue that seems to dominate my professional wardrobe. It's put me in a better than average mood, which is always a plus. Maybe I'll actually take a lunch today and go outside and enjoy the sunshine while I eat.

(And I'll explain the title tomorrow)

I wrote here today because Caryn is on vacation. I thought I'd link to it instead of just reposting it on my site.

The answers to the lyric meme are behind the cut.

I started posting earlier today about being exhausted, but I was so tired I closed the browser without saving. I didn't sleep well at all last night, I had this awful nightmare about being kidnapped, which, thankfully, I can't really remember as much of as I could earlier. It was really scary and my sleep wasn't restful at all. I'll be going to bed after I post this, a good hour and a half to two hours before I usually do. I didn't get up and work out this morning, which I have tried to be so good about, I was that exhausted. I want to get good sleep tonight so I can have energy for my morning walk tomorrow.

I've been cleaning the house since I got home from work, and I raced home at lunch to clean too. The scarycrazy housemates are moving out, so we're interviewing prospective housemates. Never do that. I was late getting back, and I asked David to finish cleaning our bathroom- to clean the mirror and sweep/mop the floor. I had Tilex'd the shower and cleaned the counter, including the fixtures, so what I asked him to do wasn't any more than I had done myself. I got home at 6 and he was still in his bathrobe and our bathroom was still icky. GRRR. I am so glad I am going to have my own bathroom in two weeks! I'm going to miss Mer, but not all the drama of life with her. They're moving because T is getting out of juvie in a couple of weeks and he can't move back in here. We've had a lot of interest in the rooms from our ad on Craigslist, so I'm hoping we'll find some good people to move in and share our home.

...in the "Race to 250", which really wasn't so much a race but maybe a walkathon... but the prize goes to Jo. I'm going to email her to make sure it's something she'll like, but since she didn't know any of the songs in the last post, I thought she might like some new music and her prize will be a CD with all of them on it.