life as i know it

This has been a banner week for me.   

UNUM, the company that paid my short term disability policy when I had to reduce my work hours a year ago, sent me a letter this week telling me they overpaid my claim and they want their money back.  I have two weeks to decide if I want to write them a check for thousands of dollars, or provide them with my bank account information so they can withdraw money over time.

How do you people sleep at night? I wondered as I read the letter, thinking about what a despicable thing it was to demand repayment a year after they made the mistake on the claim - especially when it was their own fault.

I took the letter to a knowledgeable man at my workplace and said, “Can they really do that?”

“Absolutely not,” he said at first. 

Then he read the letter again.  “At least, I don’t think so.”

Then, “Well, maybe…”

Oh boy.

*

That evening I was too anxious to eat, so I took a walk to the market to pick up a few things. When I checked out and started for home it wasn’t even 8 p.m., but it was completely dark, and a light drizzle had started to fall.  I was two blocks from my house when I heard a woman’s voice screaming from inside a parked Bronco.  I stopped walking so I could listen closer and see if she was calling for help.

As I was standing there under a street lamp, listening to her scream, the Bronco roared to life and pulled up to the sidewalk where I was standing.  The passenger door opened, and a girl about four inches taller and 75 pounds heavier than me jumped out and started pelting me with raw eggs.

“You f—ing b—ch!” she screamed as she pummeled me with eggs.  “You stupid f—ing b—ch!”  

A few seconds later, she got into the car, and it roared down the street.  But a MAX train was coming down the tracks that crossed the street.  The alarm bells started clanging, and a solid white arm dropped down, blocking the road.  So the Bronco was stuck there at the intersection just half a block away. 

When I realized what was happening, I grabbed my phone out of my bag and started running towards the vehicle so I could get the license plate and report it to the police.  The girl saw me coming, jumped out of the back seat again, and started running towards me. 

“You wanna piece of me, b—ch!?” she screamed.  “You wanna piece of me!?”

For a split second, I considered her question.  My stubborn self kind of did want a piece of this obnoxious girl.  But then I realized that the train only came every 15 minutes, leaving the platform abandoned for long stretches of time.  It would only take her sitting on my chest for 4 minutes to deplete my oxygen supply, and leave my lifeless body on the tracks.

No, I decided, slowly backing away, I don’t want a piece of you.

She got more raw eggs from somewhere, and suddenly she was running after me, chasing me down the sidewalk as shells were breaking at my feet.  And then the guardrail went up, the alarm bells stopped clanging, and she ran back to the car and hopped in as she and her posse roared away.

I called 911 to report the incident, and the dispatcher told me to stay where I was.  “The police are on their way,” she said.

I stood there in the rain for 35 minutes, waiting for an officer to come take the report.  About 20 minutes into it, I thought about giving up and walking home, but then I worried they’d think I’d prank called them.  My story was implausible to begin with – they’d never believe me if I disappeared before completing the report.

Finally two handsome 30-something-year-old cops who were 6’ tall with dark hair and broad shoulders climbed out of their squad car.  They were both sporting bullet-proof vests over their short-sleeved uniforms, and I wondered why they didn’t have jackets.  But they stood there in front of me -  forearm muscles bulging, thumbs hooked through their belt loops –  staring me down.

I started to tell them what happened, how I stopped to see if the girl was calling for help and ended up running for my life down the sidewalk while she chased after me with handfuls of eggs and strings of obscenities.  I wanted these officers to get the full experience, so at one point while I was giving report, I set down my shopping bag and purse so I could act it out. 

I took a few steps backwards, then took a running start and came at them waving my arms and yelling, “You wanna piece of me?  You wanna piece of me?”  I expected them to express shock and concern.  But instead, they laughed.  First in subtle, chest-shaking giggles, and then with bold guffaws, drops of night rain splashing off their perfectly-whitened teeth.

*

The following evening, I had dinner with a cute guy I just met.  

I followed all my first-date rules to a T.

Arrive on time – not eagerly early or lackadaisically late. 

Don’t order hard alcohol (which signals, “I’m a party girl”) or beer (“I’m just one of the guys.”)

Don’t order finger food (too messy) and never, under any circumstances, order pasta (because, let’s face it, there is no graceful way to eat it.)

First we ordered drinks.  He asked for a beer, and I asked for a glass of Chardonnay. The server asked for my I.D., and I fished my license out of my purse. She inspected it, then said, “Wow, when you walked in here I thought you were 15 or something!  But you were born in 1978!?  You’re way older than you look.”

After that auspicious beginning, we ordered our entrees.  He got a burger, no onions, and I got a salad, dressing on the side. 

 

“We can toss the dressing with the salad if you’d like,” the server said.

“No thanks,” I said.  “On the side is great.”

When our meals came, we were engrossed in conversation and I didn’t realize that my plate was half-way off the table. As I was talking, I picked up my knife and fork and pressed them into the pile of butter lettuce on my plate.  And then the plate flipped over onto my lap, and lettuce leaves, sunflower seeds, and a cup full of thick brown salad dressing spilled onto my white shirt and denim skirt.

I did not jump up or throw the food off of my lap to minimize the damage; instead, I sat there absorbing the impact of the worst disaster I’ve ever had in the past decade of dating.  Never, ever, have I spilled an entire plate of food on my lap.

My wide-eyed companion recovered quickly, gave me his napkin, and said, “I had a friend who spilled food on himself on all of his first dates, just to break the ice.”

“Yeah, let’s go with that,” I said, realizing as I excused myself to go to the restroom that this particular ice-breaker looked more like brown, sticky vomit. 

As I was walking down the hall towards the restroom, I ran into our server.  She grabbed my elbow, pulled me close to her, and whispered, “That’s why I said you should get the dressing tossed into your salad rather than on the side.”  She winked at me with satisfaction, released my arm, and walked away, leaving me to tend to my ruined outfit and my wounded pride.

*

Tonight on my way home from a long day in the clinic, I stopped at Walgreens to pick up the refills of the medications I take as part of my breast cancer treatments. I opened the paper bag to make sure I had the right medicines, and realized that the orange bottles were topped with pink, rather than the usual white, lids in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month.

You’ve gotta be freaking kidding me, I thought, annoyed at the illogical gesture – because if you’re taking breast cancer medicines, chances are you’re very well aware of the disease.  Walgreens, go raise other peoples’ awarenesses and leave mine alone, I sputtered.  Because most days I’ve got more cancer awareness than I know what to do with.

As I drove home, I thought about the five years that have passed since my original cancer diagnosis.  I thought about how the words, “You have breast cancer” that fell out of my surgeon’s mouth sounded like a death sentence at the time. 

I remembered how hard I fought to get through the treatments and the pneumonia and sepsis that followed.

I thought about the high points I’ve experienced since then – dancing with my brothers at their weddings, getting a call from an MSNBC.com reporter about my blog, feeling my patients relax when I tell them I’m going to take good care of them, hanging out with homeless people, feeling the sun on my face, watching the sun set across the Pacific Northwest sky, sitting in my pajamas with a cup of chamomile tea and my laptop, writing my heart out.

I also thought about the low points, especially this week.  Dealing with the disability disaster, getting laughed at while raindrops and egg yolks were dripping off of me,  and feeling like a ridiculously clumsy girl.

I thought about how I still put up with hot flashes, joint aches and sometimes debilitating fatigue, willing to do (almost) anything to prevent the cancer from coming back. 

Willing to suffer all of it for the chance to live this complicated, messy, embarrassing, scary, beautiful life.

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