A Better Day Next Thursday
This is our family code for soap opera-like occurrences in real life. I did have a time in my life when I watched the afternoon soapy doings, and did get caught up in the ramped up level of emotional emergencies. I was home with little children, no car and no neighbors, overworked and bored to tears. I do see the pull of escaping into a world where everyone LOVES or HATES or engages in other full tilt fantasies, real life is more often vanilla or no ice cream at all.
Once in a while I meet people who manage to live like that, or happen to, magnets for trouble. It seems to me that emergency personnel need a level of adrenaline in their lives, for which we all should be grateful. I wonder about the emotional junkies, is it just fate or a self-produced inclination towards accidents? At any rate, we have a larger than life example right here in River Campground (not its real name)
Sally (not her real name either) is a slender attractive brunette in her 40’s who lives here in one of the cabins with her not quite right daughter. She has a husky Lucky Strike voice with a Texas twang to it, which is usually amazed and astonished at something. She dresses 20 something, and looks pretty good in it. Although I am sort of the CG Mom, she usually only goes to the gentlemen for help, which is needed on a regular and tearful basis.
The first story she will tell you is about how she fell through a plate glass window at her birthday party some years ago, and nearly severed her arm on the shards. She has the scars to prove it, and enough nerves and maybe ligaments were cut that she has limited use of her right hand. Lots of operations and lots of therapy (but she refused blood transfusions) and now she is trying to get disability money on top of her welfare check. Clearly she can’t work, and she fears aloud and often that she might hurt herself or even her daughter trying to do things with her maimed arm.
At the office that would give her disability money, she got mad and kicked a table and threw her back out.
The daughter, who is about 6, is either going to be a tough cookie survivor or come to a bad end. We hear tales of her violent behavior in school, and although she is hollered at on a regular basis, seems to do what she pleases most of the time. Sally hints that someone they knew molested the daughter and that there is a court case about it ongoing. One evening, the daughter went with the assistant manager (the only sane, sober, reliable cast member) to his nephew’s birthday party. When they were not yet due for another 20 minutes, she came to my door in tears that something awful had happened. A phone call was made but the daughter was home in plenty of time.
I don’t know for certain Sally drinks,(although I suspect so) but we could have our own AA meeting right here and probably should. She hangs out with, and on, Mr. Creased Jeans. He sucks it down pretty good, and last weekend he got rowdy and “wrecked her cabin”, but “ they had a long talk and are buddies again.”
Two trailers down, Mr. Blue Pickup has a campfire every Friday night and tells louder and perhaps funnier stories as he gets drunker. I think he may have scared off his neighbors, the Mr. & Mrs. Motorhome Building a House, as they left suddenly last Saturday.
Three or four days ago, some of Sally’s Valium turned up missing. So far this incident makes little sense. She says she was passed out and that Mr. Pickled Contractor came into her cabin, using a key, and stole some of her drugs, but not all. This was met with a little bit of skepticism, but she called the Sheriff anyway. She has at least 3 dogs in there, none of whom have any use for Mr. Pickled, and he is the last person we would let have a key to anything. The Sheriff took down all the particulars, including the false address, license and registration numbers on the sign-in sheet of Mr. Pickled, and one of the pill bottles for fingerprints.
Mr. Pickled is in trouble here anyway, since he is supposed to work 20 hours a week to pay for his cabin, and has not. He smells of stale beer, has blue eyes that don’t seem to aim where he is looking and generally appears pretty scary. Not the person I would choose to accuse of stealing my drugs. And apparently, he is well known to the law here east of the Pecos.
Yesterday, the assistant manager came to me for ice. It seems that Sally was trying to hang up or move a rug that had dog poop on it. Her hand slipped and she punched herself in the eye and knocked herself unconscious. The assistant manager found her crawling on his porch saying she couldn’t see or walk and would he carry her home? (he did not) She was spotted with an ice pack several times and last I saw she had a bandage over the eye and she was going to call her Dr. and see if he was open (on Sat. after Thanksgiving)
Earlier that morning, Mr. Pickled drove up to his cabin, picked something up and went away. I heard Mr. Creased Jeans calling the Sheriff. His cell phone doesn’t work inside his trailer and he may be a little deaf because all his calls are pretty public.
Understand, that a lot of this is hearsay, and a lot reported by Sally to various people, so there is a chance it is an exaggeration in places, but it is entertaining and a little pathetic whatever the real truth might be. Which is beside the point, as the level of fantastic awfulization is the real point of the story.
Sunday update. She did get to medical attention yesterday, and then to one hospital and then to another. And while being operated on for the eye (maybe a detached retina) something wrong with her heart has been discovered. The saintly assistant manager is looking after the daughter, and I figure you, dear reader, think I am making all this up. Stay tuned.
Wed. Although she checked herself out of the hospital 2 days early, missed another surgery, she can now sort of see. We only have her word for what happened, stitches in her cornea ? a partially detached retina. She is talking about suing the Dr who refused to give her directions after she got lost in San Antonio, the Dr apparently feels she was uncooperative.
I think I have related enough of this tale, although I am sure that there will be worse and more of it.
Once in a while I meet people who manage to live like that, or happen to, magnets for trouble. It seems to me that emergency personnel need a level of adrenaline in their lives, for which we all should be grateful. I wonder about the emotional junkies, is it just fate or a self-produced inclination towards accidents? At any rate, we have a larger than life example right here in River Campground (not its real name)
Sally (not her real name either) is a slender attractive brunette in her 40’s who lives here in one of the cabins with her not quite right daughter. She has a husky Lucky Strike voice with a Texas twang to it, which is usually amazed and astonished at something. She dresses 20 something, and looks pretty good in it. Although I am sort of the CG Mom, she usually only goes to the gentlemen for help, which is needed on a regular and tearful basis.
The first story she will tell you is about how she fell through a plate glass window at her birthday party some years ago, and nearly severed her arm on the shards. She has the scars to prove it, and enough nerves and maybe ligaments were cut that she has limited use of her right hand. Lots of operations and lots of therapy (but she refused blood transfusions) and now she is trying to get disability money on top of her welfare check. Clearly she can’t work, and she fears aloud and often that she might hurt herself or even her daughter trying to do things with her maimed arm.
At the office that would give her disability money, she got mad and kicked a table and threw her back out.
The daughter, who is about 6, is either going to be a tough cookie survivor or come to a bad end. We hear tales of her violent behavior in school, and although she is hollered at on a regular basis, seems to do what she pleases most of the time. Sally hints that someone they knew molested the daughter and that there is a court case about it ongoing. One evening, the daughter went with the assistant manager (the only sane, sober, reliable cast member) to his nephew’s birthday party. When they were not yet due for another 20 minutes, she came to my door in tears that something awful had happened. A phone call was made but the daughter was home in plenty of time.
I don’t know for certain Sally drinks,(although I suspect so) but we could have our own AA meeting right here and probably should. She hangs out with, and on, Mr. Creased Jeans. He sucks it down pretty good, and last weekend he got rowdy and “wrecked her cabin”, but “ they had a long talk and are buddies again.”
Two trailers down, Mr. Blue Pickup has a campfire every Friday night and tells louder and perhaps funnier stories as he gets drunker. I think he may have scared off his neighbors, the Mr. & Mrs. Motorhome Building a House, as they left suddenly last Saturday.
Three or four days ago, some of Sally’s Valium turned up missing. So far this incident makes little sense. She says she was passed out and that Mr. Pickled Contractor came into her cabin, using a key, and stole some of her drugs, but not all. This was met with a little bit of skepticism, but she called the Sheriff anyway. She has at least 3 dogs in there, none of whom have any use for Mr. Pickled, and he is the last person we would let have a key to anything. The Sheriff took down all the particulars, including the false address, license and registration numbers on the sign-in sheet of Mr. Pickled, and one of the pill bottles for fingerprints.
Mr. Pickled is in trouble here anyway, since he is supposed to work 20 hours a week to pay for his cabin, and has not. He smells of stale beer, has blue eyes that don’t seem to aim where he is looking and generally appears pretty scary. Not the person I would choose to accuse of stealing my drugs. And apparently, he is well known to the law here east of the Pecos.
Yesterday, the assistant manager came to me for ice. It seems that Sally was trying to hang up or move a rug that had dog poop on it. Her hand slipped and she punched herself in the eye and knocked herself unconscious. The assistant manager found her crawling on his porch saying she couldn’t see or walk and would he carry her home? (he did not) She was spotted with an ice pack several times and last I saw she had a bandage over the eye and she was going to call her Dr. and see if he was open (on Sat. after Thanksgiving)
Earlier that morning, Mr. Pickled drove up to his cabin, picked something up and went away. I heard Mr. Creased Jeans calling the Sheriff. His cell phone doesn’t work inside his trailer and he may be a little deaf because all his calls are pretty public.
Understand, that a lot of this is hearsay, and a lot reported by Sally to various people, so there is a chance it is an exaggeration in places, but it is entertaining and a little pathetic whatever the real truth might be. Which is beside the point, as the level of fantastic awfulization is the real point of the story.
Sunday update. She did get to medical attention yesterday, and then to one hospital and then to another. And while being operated on for the eye (maybe a detached retina) something wrong with her heart has been discovered. The saintly assistant manager is looking after the daughter, and I figure you, dear reader, think I am making all this up. Stay tuned.
Wed. Although she checked herself out of the hospital 2 days early, missed another surgery, she can now sort of see. We only have her word for what happened, stitches in her cornea ? a partially detached retina. She is talking about suing the Dr who refused to give her directions after she got lost in San Antonio, the Dr apparently feels she was uncooperative.
I think I have related enough of this tale, although I am sure that there will be worse and more of it.
posted by Thistledown24 at 5:40 AM
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